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THE  LOGIC  OF  REASON, 


UNIVERSAL  AND  ETERNAL. 


BY 


LAURENS    P.   HICKOK,  D.  D.,  LL.  D. 


BOSTON: 
LEE   AND    SHEPARD,   PUBLISHERS. 

NEW  YORK: 
LEE,  SHEPARD  AND   DILLINGHAM. 

1875. 


Entered,  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1874, 

BY   L.  P.  HICKOK, 
In  the  Office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress,  at  Washington. 


Stereotyped  at  the  Boston  Stereotype  Foundry, 
No.  19  Spring  Lane. 


PREFACE. 


PHYSICAL  SCIENCE  and  Speculative  Philosophy  are 
fast  forcing  to  the  result,  that  knowledge  cannot  be 
made  so  positive  as  wholly  to  displace  sincere  scepti- 
cism by  any  modes  of  logic  or  dialectic  hitherto  ap- 
plied. Through  all  past  ages  an  assumed  knowledge 
has  been  able  to  find  some  ground  on  which  to  main- 
tain its  own  convictions,  but  never  with  so  clear  a 
title  that  scepticism  has  not  interposed  its  honest 
doubt  of  entire  validity.  In  the  present  age,  the  ul- 
timate sources  for  both  conviction  and  doubt  are  so 
closely  examined,  that  the  crisis  seems  approaching  in 
which  the  two  cannot  stand  together  on  common 
ground,  and  longer  dispute  the  right  to  possession,  but 
one  or  the  other  will  attain  an  acknowledged  exclu- 
sive ownership.  The  admission  must  ere  long  be 
made,  that  nothing  can  be  truly  known  by  the  human 
mind,  and  that  consciousness  itself  is  but  a  seeming, 
as  in  hallucination  or  a  dream,  or  that  we  do  know 
absolutely  some  truths  universal  and  eternal ;  and 
such  exclusion  of  all  question  in  the  case  must  come 
by  the  use  of  our  own  intelligence,  for  even  revela- 
tion cannot  help  us  till  it  shall  be  put  on  ground 

3 


4  PEEFACE. 

which  our  intellectual  faculties  can  reach,  and  unan- 
swerably test  the  validity  of  its  authority. 

A  strong  conviction  that  modes  of  logic  at  present 
used  can  never  attain  to  absolute  knowledge,  but 
must  stop  short  in  confirmed  scepticism,  puts  an  im- 
perative upon  us  to  seek  out  a  better  logic,  by  which 
known  truths  may  be  held  forever  sure.  And  al- 
though few,  comparatively,  now  see  that  such  better 
logic  is  the  only  way  to  escape  an  all-pervading  scep- 
ticism, yet  the  full  belief  that  the  period  is  not  far 
distant  when  this  must  become  a  general  conviction, 
and  a  new  and  better  logic  be  a  wide-felt  want,  lays 
an  additional  claim  upon  us  to  do  what  we  may,  not 
only  to  hasten  on  this  certain  issue,  but  also  to  do 
what  we  can  to  meet  this  coming  want.  Whether 
more  or  less  shall  thereby  be  contributed  to  such 
hopeful  results,  precisely  these  considerations  have 
pressed  to  the  present  undertaking. 

AMHEEST,  MASS.,  1874. 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

INTRODUCTION 13 

Facts  of  matter  and  facts  of  mind  to  be  connectively  determined 
in  One  Philosophy.  This  universal  Philosophy  is  in  Reason,  and 
hence  the  necessity  of  an  ultimate  logical  rule,  comprehending  all 
experience  in  pre-requisite  conditions.  Abstractions  from  experience 
cannot  give  law  to  experience,  and  only  by  a  comprehension  of 
experience  in  the  concrete  can  we  attain  its  law.  And  this  requires 
Two  Parts :  I.  That  we .  note  the  prominent  forms  of  Abstract 
Logic.  II.  That  we  attain  a  Logic  concretely  universal. 


PART  I. 
PROMINENT   FORMS   OP   ABSTRACT   LOGIC. 

I. 

LOGIC  OF  MATHEMATICS 20 

Mathematic  is  mensuration  of  Quantity.  This  has"  two  parts : 
Equation  of  known  and  unknown  magnitudes  by  applying  a  unit  of 
measure,  and  the  Calculus  of  value  by  a  numerical  computation. 
Rational  Mathematic  has  pure  diagrams,  any  one  of  which  includes 
the  universal  of  the  same  kind.  The  Algebraic  and  the  Arithmetic 
Calculus.  The  Transcendental  Analysis.  The  grand  error  is  that 
Mathematic  is  made  an  Abstract  Science.  Cannot  be  both  Abstract 
and  Universal,  the  latter  of  which  it  must  be.  It  has  its  necessary 
restrictions  in  itself  and  its  exclusions  from  philosophy;  but  its 
pure  constructions  stand  the  very  first  in  concrete  logic,  and  thus 
the  logic  of  Mathematics  is  essential  for  philosophy. 

5 


6  CONTENTS. 

II. 

THE   SYLLOGISTIC  LOGIC 25 

Abstraction  and  Generalization  convenient  for  classifying,  and 
a  pleasant  mental  exercise ;  hence  the  production  of  Aristotle's 
Logic.  Altogether  an  abstract  from  experience,  and  never  reach- 
ing the  reason.  Its  Elements  are,  —  1.  Conceptions.  2.  Judg- 
ments. 3.  Laws  of  Thought.  4.  Syllogisms.  Inductive  Logic  is 
subsidiary  to  Deductive,  the  whole  determined  by  fixed  abstrac- 
tions from  experience.  Its  ruling  is  rigidly  immutable,  and  all 
change  or  motion  in  one  and  the  same  thing  is  inconceivable. 
Its  laws  exclude  chemical  combination^  conversions  of  Force,  make 
matter  inert,  and  illimitable  Space  and  Tune  unknown.  Science 
and  philosophy  have  gone  beyond  it. 

III. 

TRANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC 36 

Not  the  object  determines  the  thought,  but  the  thought  deter- 
mines the  object.  Outline  of  Kant's  Logic;  of  Fichte's;  more 
fully  of  Hegel's.  Taking  thought-activity  as  Absolute  from  his 
Phenomenology,  and  abstract  Being,  with  its  counterpart  Naught, 
from  the  Old  Logic,  Hegel  has  preparation  for  his  Science  of  Logic. 
This,  produced  into  externality,  gives  his  Science  of  Nature ;  and, 
returned  to  internality,  gives  his  Science  of  Mind.  His  Logic 
shown  to  be  deficient  in  the  following  points  :  1.  It  is  not  self- 
developed,  but  is  an  empirical  outgrowth.  2.  Its  attained  Reason 
is  ambiguous.  3.  It  can  give  no  ultimate  moral  Rule.  4.  Can  admit 
of  no  communication  in  human  experience,  nor  of  a  common  Space 
and  Time.  5.  Has  no  other  Force  than  the  thought- activity. 

When  Aristotle's  Logic  and  Hegel's  are  compared,  —  1.  The 
former  cannot  move,  the  latter  cannot  rest.  2.  Neither  can  deter- 
mine universal  experience.  3.  Both  together  might  determine,  but 
neither  can  transcend  experience.  4.  The  Transcendental  depends 
upon  the  Old  Logic.  5.  The  certitude  to  which  either  may  arrive. 


CONTENTS.  7 

IV. 

THE  LOGIC  OF  FORCE 77 

This  is  diverse  from  the  last,  in  that  this  connects  all  phenomena 
by  forces,  while  that  connected  all  thoughts  in  a  counter-activity. 
It  has  been  best  systematized  by  Herbert  Spencer.  Its  outline  is 
given  in  assuming  that  the  conflict  between  Religion  and  Science 
may  be  harmonized  in  the  logic  of  Evolution ;  then  showing  what 
Evolution  is  ;  what  its  law,  and  the  principles  underlying  the 
process.  It  puts  "effect"  for  "phenomenon,"  and  "persistence  in 
consciousness  "  for  the  "  real,"  and  then  finds  force  as  the  Ultimate 
in  all  relative  realities.  Other  logical  Elements  are  also  given,  but 
the  essential  is  this  "ultimate  of  ultimates"  in  the  last  analysis  of 
Force,  from  which  all  logical  synthesis  must  begin.  Objections  are 
noted  in  several  particulars,  but  the  conclusive  refutation  of  the 
logic  of  evolution  from  Absolute  Force,  is,  that  it  essays  the  self- 
absurdity  of  thinking  relatively  and  knowing  absolutely  by  one  and 
the  same  'faculty.  Force  is  needed  for  both  science  and  philosophy, 
but  force  and  the  logic  applied  cannot  go  together. 


PART  II. 

LOGIC  OF    CONCRETE    UNIVERSALITY. 
PRE-REQUISITE    CONDITIONS 95 

All  preceding  forms  of  Logic  found  to  be  abstractions  from 
experience,  while  only  the  concrete  integration  of  experienee  can 
satisfy.  After  experience,  the  insight  of  reason  must  find  the  pre- 
requisite conditions  that  made  experience  itself  possible,  and  neces- 
sarily as  it  is.  This  in  three  applied  directions :  1.  Conditions 
without  which  the  experience  cannot  be.  2.  Conditions  with  which 
the  experience  must  be.  3.  Conditions  evincing  the  experience  to 
have  been  a  purposed  end.  Experience  includes,  commonly,  that 
which  has  come  within  consciousness,  but  properly,  also,  that  which 
insight  brings  within  reason-consciousness ;  and  this  is  to  be  con- 
sidered in  Three  States. 


8  CONTENTS. 

I. 

PUKE  FIGURE  AND  INORGANIC  BODIES. 

1.  EXPERIENCE  IN  CONCRETE   PURE   QUANTITY 102 

This  is  wholly  limited  to  the  subjective  consciousness.  Some  of 
the  prominent  facts  in  which  to  find  the  pre-requisite  conditions. 
Why  reject  the  abstract  construction  for  the  concrete?  There  are 
two  distinct  activities  —  the  subservient  and  the  dominant  —  in  all 
pure  mathematical  construction.  The  subservient  gives  merely 
place  and  period;  the  dominant  determines  places  and  periods  in 
illimitable  Space  and  Time. 

2.  EXPERIENCE  WITHIN  CONCRETE  QUALITY 114 

Pure  figure  is  here  carried  on  to  an  object  in  sense.  The  promi- 
nent facts  for  attaining  the  pre-requisite  conditions  for  such  expe- 
rience. Sensation,  as  first  given  by  impression  on  the  organs,  is 
manifold.  This  must  be,  —  1.  Distinguished  intellectually.  2.  De- 
fined. 3.  Embodied.  Material  bodies  are  apprehended,  as  in  place 
and  period,  and  known  by  reason,  as  in  Space  and  Time.  Why 
the  capability  of  abstraction  and  generalization  in  man  exceeds  that 
in  the  animal. 

3.  EXPERIENCE  IN  CONCRETE  RELATION 122 

Not  merely  relations  as  classified  in  place  and  period,  but  con- 
nections by  intrinsic  efficiency.  Leading  facts  for  the  insight  of 
reason.  Communication  of  thought  must  be  through  sensation, 
and  this  is  from  organic  impression  induced  by  foreign  force.  The 
force  impressing  must  express  the  thought,  and  thus  must  accord 
with  the  thought-activity.  This  must  require  counter  single  energies 
either  in  antagonism  or  diremption;  the  former  is  substantial  mat- 
ter, the  latter  is  ethereal  heat  and  light.  The  interaction  of  mate- 
rial and  ethereal  forces  induces  a  revolving  force,  and  these  three 
varieties  of  force  are  essentially  elementary  for  all  phenomenal 
movements,  connections,  and  dependencies.  They  may  be  known 
as  real,  distinct  from  ideal,  by  their  determinate  existence  in  one 
common  Space  and  Time. 


CONTENTS.  9 

II. 

ORGANIC  LIFE   AND  ACTIVITY. 

1.  LEADING   PACTS    OF   LIFE    RUNNING    THROUGH    FROM 

CONSCIOUS  TO  UNCONSCIOUS  AGENCY 134 

An  intrinsic  urgency  determines  all  living  activity,  and  this  ur- 
gency differs  in  different  grades  of  consciousness.  In  all  rational 
action,  the  urgency  is  imperative\  In  sentient  activity,  it  is  appe- 
titive. In '  spontanous  action,  it  is  instinctive.  In  growth  and 
reproduction,  the  instinctive  is  also  selective.  In  all  organic  ac- 
tion, there  is  force,  and  in  addition,  there  is  a  feeling  of  need  which 
uses  the  force.  This  combination  of  a  want  in  possession  of  force 
is  Life ;  the  want  prompts  and  the  force  executes,  and  the  elemental 
want  uses  only  its  own  possessed  elemental  force.  The  urgency 
has  its  respective  intent  in  different  life-powers,  and  is  the  instinc- 
tive source  for  its  distinctive  species.  The  grade  of  consciousness 
attained  is  the  measure  of  the  authority  in  elevated  rule,  and  so 
determines  the  distinctive  Kingdoms. 

2.  LEADING  ORGANIC  FACTS  IN  THE  VEGETABLE  KINGDOM.   139 

In  plant-life,  the  action  is  direct  upon  inorganic  substance,  and 
assimilates  specific  elements  for  the  sole  end  of  organic  embodi- 
ment. Specific  life-power  manifested  in  sap-circulation.  Propaga- 
tion by  section,  by  spores  and  tubers,  by  sex-generation.  Ancestral 
type  in  the  life-want  is  perpetuated  in  the  species.  The  sole  ur- 
gency in  the  Vegetable  Kingdom  is  a  want  to  the  end  of  construct- 
ing an  organism,  and  in  reproducing  its  kind;  and  the  individual 
exists  in  the  organism,  and  is  lost  in  its  dissolution. 

3.  LEADING  ORGANIC  FACTS  IN  THE  ANIMAL  KINGDOM.  .     UT 

The  Animal  body  is  built  from  previous  life-assimilation.  Brute- 
life  is  distinct  from  plant-life,  in  that  its  want  is  to  the  end  of  sen- 
sation through  an  irritable  nerve-organization.  Constructive  action 
is  instinctive,  as  in  plant-life,  and  conscious  sensation  wakes  in  the 
organism,  and  thenceforward  urges  it  as  appetite.  Sentient  con- 
sciousness attains  brute-intelligence,  and  the  individual  perishes  in 


10  CONTENTS. 

the   organic  destruction.      The   unity  of  species   is  preserved  by 
transmitting  the  parental  type  through  the  generative  process. 

4.    LEADING  ORGANIC  FACTS  IN  THE  HUMAN  FAMILY.  .    .     151 

The  human  Organism  is  constructed  as  instinctively  as  is  that  of 
animal  or  plant,  but  to  the  higher  end  of  spiritual  activity  in 
reason.  The  reason-imperative  is  a  counter-check  to  appetite, 
from  which  is  self-determination  and  responsible  disposition.  The 
alliance  of  sense  and  reason  makes  the  sentient  soul  immortal,  and 
demands  retribution,  according  to  fixed  disposition.  Man  crowns 
nature,  and  holds  in  himself  mechanical  force,  instinct,  sense,  and 
-reason.  The  mode  of  using  the  possessed  force  evinces  that  it  is 
originally  diremptive,  and  thus  ethereal.  The  organic  and  inor- 
ganic are  in  universal  connection,  while  the  rational  in  man  is 
competent  to  spiritual  communion  with  its  finite  personalities,  and 
with  the  Absolute  Spirit.  Man  is  thus  both  natural  and  super- 
natural. 

III. 

ABSOLUTE    BEING    ABOVE    ALL    FINITE    EXPE- 
EIENCES. 

GRADES  OF  EXPERIENCE 162 

Experience  in  the  following  grades  :  illusive,  mental,  phenomenal, 
scientific,  and  philosophical ;  giving  in  the  last  a  knowledge  of  sub- 
.  stantial  Force  and  essential  Life,  the  highest  which  human  con- 
sciousness attains.  Force  and  Life  we  are,  but  their  Source  we  are 
not  and  cannot  experience.  Our  reason  may  see  in  them  what,  as 
source,  is  conditional  for  them ;  and  thus  we  may  reach  the  Abso- 
lute in  our  knowledge  with  no  participation  in  the  Absolute  Expe- 
rience. 

From  the  transcendental  facts  now  attained,  we  may  further 
find, — 

1.  PRE-REQUISITE  CONDITIONS  FOR  FORCE 169 

Force,  as  antagonist  or  diremptive,  is  the  universal  substance,  and 
the  energizing  source  is  adequate  for  all  force,  and  so  is  Omnipotent. 
In  all  force,  and  so  is  Omnipresent.  Through  all  periods,  and  so  is 


CONTENTS.  11 

Eternal.  All  forces  are  reciprocal,  and  so  in  unity,  making  a  uni- 
verse ;  but  their  source  is  conditional  for,  and  so  independent  of,  the 
universe,  and  the  essential  laws  of  the  forces  were  in  the  source 
when  as  yet  the  universe  was  not. 

2.  rilE-REQUISITE  CONDITIONS  FOR  LIFE 172 

The  elements  of  life  must  have  each  their  source,  and  their  com- 
bination to  their  end  must  be  of  one  source.  And  so  of  sentient 
life,  its  combination  in  an  organism  must  have  its  own  one  source, 
and  the  appetitive  urgency,  moving  from  place  to  place,  must  have 
its  one  source,  and  the  reason,  holding  the  human  in  personality, 
must  have  its  own  source ;  and  hence,  as  ultimate  source,  we  may 
say,  as  Revelation  does,  "In  Him  we  live,  and  move,  and  have  our 
being."  Man,  as  crowning  the  universe,  is  embodied  reason;  the 
independent  source  of  the  universe  is  unembodied  Absolute  Reason ; 
and  while  we  may  know  the  Absolute,  our  experience  cannot  be 
with  his. 

3.  HUMAN    REASON   MAY   KNOW  WHAT   IS  ESSENTIAL  IN 

ABSOLUTE  REASON 178 

Not  an  abstract,  but  a  concrete  Absolute ;  and  man,  knowing  him- 
self, may  know  much  of  the  Absolute,  in  the  image  and  likeness  of 
which  he  himself  is.  Human  experience  is  within,  the  Absolute  is 
independent  of  the  universe ;  and  we  gain  knowledge  of  him,  by 
successive  steps,  in  his  possession  of  the  following  attributes  and 
perfections,  viz.,  that  he  is  self-essential,  self-intelligent,  self- 
sufficient;  has  self-possession,  self-approbation,  threefold  activity 
in  concert ;  is  creator  of  substantial  Force,  one  Being  in  threefold 
personality ;  "  does  all  for  his  own  glory ;  "  governs  nature  by  neces- 
sary connections,  and  free-agency  by  rational  urgency;  makes  mi- 
raculous interventions  ;  gives  reasonably  permission  to  free  action, 
even  in  sin ;  maintains  perpetual  conscious  tranquillity  and  serenity ; 
and  makes  himself  known  as  Absolutely  Universal  and  Eternal.  In 
this  is  the  triumph  and  termination  of  Concrete  Logic. 


INTRODUCTION. 


LONG  since,  distinction  was  made  between  that 
which  appeared  in  consciousness  through  external  or- 
gans, and  that  which  entered  by  an  activity  within ; 
and  thenceforward  experience  has  had  its  division  into 
facts  of  matter  and  facts  of  mind.  Speculative  phi- 
losophy, seeking  to  bind  all  facts  in  unity,  has  never 
been  lacking  in  opposing  theories,  one  striving  to  ex- 
pound all  experience  as  originating  in  matter,  and  the 
other  in  mind ;  and  the  partiality  arising  from  exclu- 
sive interest  in  one  or  the  other  side  of  investigation, 
while  it  has  sharpened  and  extended  inquhy  in  each, 
has  also  promoted  prejudice  and  intolerance  in  both. 

Comprehensive  thinking  cannot  be  satisfied  till  in 
some  way  both  objective  and  subjective  facts  are 
recognized  as  standing  harmoniously  in  experience 
together,  and  the  master-minds  of  all  ages  have  had 
their  different  dialectical  processes  for  connecting  all 
phenomena,  outer  or  inner,  into  an  orderly  and  con- 
sistent experience  ;  but  it  becomes  increasingly  mani- 
fest that,  conditional  for  this,  there  must  be  the  recog- 
nition of  somewhat  above  and  beyond  experience, 
which  may  become  pervasive  and  comprehensive  of 

13 


14  INTBODUCTION. 

all  experience.  True  and  adequate  logical  thought 
for  a  satisfactory  philosophy  must  reach  the  Universal 
and  Eternal. 

The  true  and  ever-living  God  alone  is  absolute  rea- 
son, and  holds  all  truth  in  himself,  and  thus  God  only 
can  see  all  truth  in  its  ultimate  and  absolute  validity, 
and  to  him  all  truth  is  one  and  self-consistent  in  his 
own  universal  being  and  knowledge.  But  finite  reason 
is  in  the  likeness  of  the  Absolute,  and  in  its  measure 
knows  as  God  knows,  and  as  thus  in  his  image  it  can 
commune  with  him  in  his  works  and  word ;  yet,  so 
knowing  God  as  he  is,  the  finite  can  comprehend  the 
Infinite  no  further  than  he  makes  expression  of  him- 
self in  creation  and  revelation.  These  expressive 
symbols  will  be  read  according  to  the  measure  of  ra- 
tional insight  applied,  and  thus  God  and  his  truth 
will  be  known  more  or  less  completely  by  the  different 
grades  of 'rational  beings  who  study  Nature  and  Rev- 
elation. All  truth  that  each  in  his  reason  knows  will 
be  fully  consistent  with  the  truths  that  others  know, 
and  with  all  that  God  knows ;  but  to  the  more  limited 
intelligence  this  consistency  of  the  lower  with  the 
higher  knowledge  may  be  inexplicable,  and  apparently 
irreconcilable,  yet  ever  will  a  more  thorough  and  com- 
prehensive vision  certainly  harmonize  them.  Reason 
in  all  its  measures  is  each  in  each  concentric,  and  all 
in  full  accord  with  the  Absolute  Reason ;  and  it  is 
moral  obliquity,  which  determinately  puts  darkness 
for  light,  that  can  alone  become  hopelessly  incorrigi- 
ble ;  while  even  such  minds,  deceiving  themselves 


INTRODUCTION.  15 

and  deluding  others,  "  can  do  nothing  against  the 
truth,  but  for  the  truth."  They  fulfil  it  in  their  wil- 
ful hostility  to  it.  All  true  science  must,  therefore, 
within  its  own  sphere,  be  valid,  and  can  contradict 
other  sciences  only  as  it  is  pushed  out  of  and  beyond 
its  sphere,  when  the  appropriate  remedy  and  sure  cor- 
rective will  be  to  remand  the  impertinent  intruder 
back  to  his  legitimate  possession.  Each  in  its  own 
appropriate  place  and  way  helps  to  complete  and  per- 
fect the  one  Universal  Philosophy,  and  so  all  may 
work  on  hopefully  and  harmoniously. 

This  one  philosophy  is  in  and  of  the  Reason,  and 
reason  must  direct  the  lower  faculties  of  intelligence 
in  perception,  judgments,  and  deductive  conclusions, 
just  as  the  life  determines  the  plant  in  its  buds,  blos- 
soms, and  fruit.  Not  only  is  there  a  guiding  reason 
diffused  through  human  thought-activity,  but  a  con- 
trolling reason  is  correspondingly  expressed  in  all  the 
connections  of  nature's  phenomena,  and  so  empirical 
observing,  and  logical  thinking,  and  speculative  phi- 
losophizing, are  all  to  be  held  in  strict  agreement  un- 
der the  determinate  sway  of  this  supreme  authority. 
There  must,  then,  be  attained  in  some  way  an  ultimate 
logical  rule  imperatively  controlling  in  all  scientific 
research,  and  putting  physical  and  metaphysical  theo- 
ries in  mutual  consistency,  before  their  combined  re- 
sults can  be  accepted  and  adopted  as  having  a  valid 
claim  to  any  place  in  the  domain  of  Universal  Philos- 
ophy. This  is  why  we  ask  for  a  Logic  of  Reason,  and 
insist  that,  in  order  to  be  trusted  as  true  and  suffi- 


16  INTRODUCTION. 

cient,  its  root  must  run  deeper  than  sense-experience, 
and  bind  all  facts  of  experience  in  pre-requisite  deter- 
mining conditions.  Abstractions  from  experience  and 
deductions  from  generalizations  of  experience  still 
keep  within  experience,  and  no  abstract  logic  can 
meet  the  demands  of  philosophy,  or  satisfy  the  want 
of  the  human  mind  for  a  science  that  shall  hold  ex- 
perience itself  in  connected  consistency.  To  take 
the  observed  order  of  experience  as  ultimate  logical 
law  is  to  leave  experience  itself  without  and  above 
law,  and  hopelessly  to  shut  out  from  human  knowl- 
edge any  sovereign  that  can  give  law  to  the  universe. 
Nature  and  man's  experience  of  nature  must  be  seen 
to  stand  in  reason,  or  nature  and  experience  are  but 
a  mere  seeming,  and  all  appearance  is  still  utter  nes- 
cience. Science  and  philosophy  live  only  as  they  take 
their  vitality  from  reason,  and  the  experience  they  at- 
tempt to  expound  must  be  ordered  ultimately  in  rea- 
son, or  it  is  left  helplessly  to  unreason. 

But  even  that  logic  which  gives  valid  determina- 
tions to  experience  must  begin  in  experience,  and  rule 
in  and  over  universal  experience,  since  a  logic  which 
had  no  experience  would  be  empty  and  worthless,  and 
a  logic  which  could  not  justify  experience  would  leave 
both  itself  and  experience  to  be  unreasonable.  We 
need  experience,  not  to  make  abstractions  from  it, 
and  deduce  general  judgments  out  of  it,  but  to  see  in 
it  the  conditions  which  have  made  it  possible,  and  the 
principles  that  determine  it  to  be  reasonable.  Logic 
is  reason,  and  an  experience  unreasonable  would  be 


INTRODUCTION.  17 

intolerable.     A  true  logic  must  satisfactorily  expound 
the  experience. 

We  must  needs  examine  the  forms  of  logic  hitherto 
prevalent  in  the  leading  theories  of  science  and  phi- 
losophy, in  order  by  the  knowledge  of  what  we  have 
to  know  better  what  we  want ;  yet  as  we  seek  not  to 
teach  their  logic,  but  only  to  find  how  much  or  little 
their  logic  can  teach  us,  we  shall  gain  what  we  need 
by  attaining  their  ultimate  results  in  the  most  com- 
pendious way.  Having  seen  what  may  be  their  defi- 
ciencies, or  errors,  we  may  the  more  readily  attain  the 
'Complete  and  true  logic.  We  seek  that  which  shall 
legitimate  a  science  of  both  matter  and  mind,  and  by 
our  finite  reason  so  to  know  the  Absolute  Reason,  as 
therein  to  comprehend  the  universe  of  conscious  and 
unconscious  being. 
2 


LOGIC  OF  REASON. 


LOGIC  gives  law  to  thought,  and  therein  legitimates 
the  knowledge  which  thinking  attains.  It  is  not  suf- 
ficient for  this  that  the  observed  order  of  facts  in 
experience  be  made  logic,  for  this  at  last  will  be  mere 
fact,  and  not  law  for  anything.  It  is  simple  mode  of 
appearance,  without  any  reason  in  it,  or  for  it ;  and 
were  it  to  include  universal  appearance,  it  could  not 
make  of  it  intelligible  experience.  An  adequate 
logic  must  get  in  the  facts,  a  pre-determining  law 
which  would  not  permit  their  order  in  experience  to 
have  been  otherwise.  One  is  but  an  abstract  from 
experience  in  the  reflective  understanding,  the  other 
is  a  determined  concrete  of  experience  in  the  com- 
prehensive reason.  To  the  former  no  experience 
can  be  made  other  than  a  seeming ;  to  the  latter  it 
has  been  made  veritable  knowing,  since  a  law  in  the 
reason  has  given  entireness  to  it.  Have  we  anywhere 
this  latter  form  of  logic?  The  inquiry  determines 
for  us  our  general  method,  — 

I.  To  note,  in  this  respect,  the  leading  forms  of 
abstract  Logic. 

II.  To  attain  a  Logic  of  concrete  universality. 

19 


PART  1. 

PROMINENT  FORMS  OF  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

I. 

LOGIC    OF   MATHEMATICS. 

MATHEMATICAL  SCIENCE  has  application  exclu- 
sively to  the  mensuration  of  Quantity,  and  deals 
with  Quality  and  Essence  in  reference  to  their  magni- 
tudes only.  It  answers  no  inquiries  of  what?  or 
from  whence  ?  but  solely  the  question  of  how  much  ? 
An  empirical  example  of  mensuration  is  given  when 
one  lays  a  rule  of  known  length  repeatedly  along  a 
line  of  unknown  extension,  keeping  count  of  the  ap- 
plications of  the  rule  and  the  fractions  of  it,  if  any ; 
and  at  the  end  of  the  process  of  applying  and  count- 
ing, the  two  main  divisions  of  all  mathematical  work 
appear.  The  unit  of  measure  applied  to  the  line  has 
given  an  Equation  of  known  and  unknown  magni- 
tudes, and  the  computation  in  the  counted  numbers 
is  the  Calculus  of  value  as  the  determined  magnitude 
of  the  unknown  length  of  line.  Thus  may  any  ap- 
propriate units  of  measure  be  applied  to  quantity 
of  place,  period,  or  intensity ;  and  as  solid,  fluid, 

20 


LOGIC  OF  MATHEMATICS.  21 

or  vapor ;  and  thereby  all  accessible  magnitudes  may 
practically  be  measured.  But  a  large  portion  of 
quantity  desired  to  be  measured  is  inaccessible,  and 
then  intermediate  relative  magnitudes  are  sought, 
whereby  ratios  of  known  to  unknown  magnitudes 
may  indirectly  be  attained,  and  equations  made  and 
values  calculated ;  examples  of  ingenious  and  exact 
solution  are  so  presented  of  great  complexity  and 
great  utility. 

Rational  Mathematics  has  its  pure  forms  of  quan- 
tity, including  magnitude  only,  without  other  content ; 
and  thereby  one  pure  form  answers  for  all  of  its  kind, 
and  the  measurement  of  one  is  virtually  the  value 
for  the  universal,  and  the  science  does  at  once  what 
is  common  determination  for  all.  In  the  constructed 
pure  lines,  surfaces,  and  volumes,  the  insight  of  reason 
detects  relations  and  proportions  between  one  and 
others,  and  thereby  resolves  unknown  magnitudes  of 
plane  and  curved  surfaces  into  exact  units  of  measure 
in  straight  lines  and  angles.  Geometry  so  serves  to 
interpose  its  relative  media  for  effecting  equations 
between  known  and  unknown  magnitudes  otherwise 
utterly  inaccessible  to  any  application  of  units  of 
measure.  Motion  and  force  admit  of  like  relative 
interposition,  and  so  Mechanics  gives  practicable 
equations  else  unattainable.  The  reason  guides  in 
the  construction  of  the  interposing  diagrams,  so  that 
their  lines  and  angles,  or  mechanical  movements, 
places,  and  periods,  present  continuous  steps  of  an 
intuitive  process  from  the  starting-point  to  the  com- 
plete demonstration. 


22  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

The  calculus  has  two  parts,  viz.,  the  algebraic  calcu- 
lus, so  transposing  by  means  of  signs  and  letters  the 
relations  of  known  and  unknown  magnitudes  as  not 
to  disturb  their  distinctive  values,  while  ministering 
to  the  clearing  of  their  relations  ;  and  the  arithmetical 
calculus,  which  follows  the  former  in  rinding  the 
values  of  the  formula  of  equations.  The  numbers 
here  are  pure  units,  and  for  their  computation  there 
are  four  pairs  of  arithmetical  functions,  as  Sum  and 
Difference,  Product  and  Quotient,  Power  and  Root, 
Exponential  and  Logarithmic  functions.  The  Al- 
gebraic refers  solely  to  the  solutions  in  the  equation, 
and  the  Arithmetical  solely  to  the  values  attained  in 
the  computation.  The  Transcendental  Analysis  has  its 
varied  methods  of  reducing  magnitudes  to  infinitesi- 
mal differences,  then  taken  as  zero  and  disregarded 
in  the  calculus,  reaching  in  the  Differential  and  Inte- 
gral to  a  broad  'field  of  otherwise  inapproachable 
mensurations. 

The  Reason  carries  mathematical  mensuration  of 
particular  magnitudes  to  absolute  universality,  and  so 
determines  for  all  coming  experience  rules  which  can- 
not be  contradicted  in  any  experience ;  but  a  logic 
for  this  is  little  apprehended,  and  must  needs  here- 
after be  clearly  presented,  while  the  logic  commonly 
applied  is  taken  wholly  from  experience,  and  can 
give  validity  to  no  demonstration  reaching  beyond, 
and  claiming  to  assert  a  necessity  for  what  may  or 
may  not  be  subject  to  experience.  Here  is,  in  fact, 
the  grand  deficiency  in  mathematical  science,  in  that 


LOGIC   OF  MATHEMATICS.  23 

it  is  made  to  rest  upon  a  logic  that  abstracts  all  it  uses 
from  sense-perceptions,  while  it  assumes  to  make  its 
demonstrations  vouchers  for  absolute  truth.  'It  is 
taken  as  wholly  an  abstract  science,  while  still  claiming 
within  its  province  to  be  a  universal  science.  Points, 
lines,  surfaces,  and  volumes  are  taken  from  empirical 
phenomena,  and  if  nature  do  not  furnish  perfect 
figures  they  cannot  be  found.  Like  pre-Raphaelism 
in  art,  nature  must  be  copied  nicely  and  exactly,  and 
the  circles  and  spheres,  cubes  and  squares,  and  other 
figures,  must  first  be  experienced  and  accurately  ob- 
served. The  places  filled  by  solid  bodies  may  be 
imaged  as  vacated  of  their  content,  while  their  out- 
lines retain  their  empty  forms,  and  so  an  abstraction 
may  be  made  general,  the  point  having  position  but 
neither  outer  nor  inner  particularity,  the  line  having 
length  but  no  breadth,  and  the  surface  breadth  but 
not  thickness.  The  particular  so  abstractly  general  is 
used  as  a  universal,  and  though  taken  from  experi- 
ence is  assumed  to  include  all  experience.  The  science 
serves  itself  by  perpetual  ambiguities,  sublimating  the 
phenomenal  to  abstractions  for  the  reason,  and  put- 
ting them  back  into  appearance  for  the  sense ;  and 
neither  method  can  serve  both  sides.  The  phenome- 
nal body  is  too  gross  for  reason,  the  abstract  image  is 
too  thin  for  sense.  The  measure  of  bodies  can  only 
suffice  each  for  itself ;  while  in  the  sense-use  of  ab- 
stract points,  lines,  and  surfaces,  no  possible  aggre- 
gates of  them  can  fill  places  and  periods ;  and  so  a 
rational  experience  is  impossible.  Abstract  place  is 


24  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

mere  emptiness,  and  not  Space,  and  abstract  period  is 
void  moment,  not  Time ;  and  thus  neither  places  nor 
periods  can  be  measured  that  are  not  already  given 
in  some  experience.  Mathematic,  with  this  logic, 
must  wait  on  experience,  or  do  its  work  alone  amid 
abstractions  which  cannot  fit  themselves  back  upon 
empirical  bodies. 

But  aside  from  this  defective  logic  of  abstraction, 
and  in  place  of  which  a  better  logic  of  concrete 
mathematics  must  be  applied,  there  are  large  re- 
strictions in  the  way  of  mathematical  mensuration 
in  its  own  province  of  quantity.  Wherever  known 
units  of  measure  can  be  used,  equations  can  be 
made ;  and  where  interfering  disturbances  and  com- 
plications can  be  avoided  or  eliminated,  calcula- 
tions of  values  can  be  attained.  This  has  largely 
been  effected  in  reference  to  inorganic  bodies  and 
their  motions,  terrestrial  and  celestial,  by  exact 
mensurations.  But  organic  quantities  have  been 
found  less  submissive.  Life  and  its  instinctive 
activities,  its  sympathies  and  affections,  its  think- 
ing, and  willing,  and  spiritual  disposing,  all  have 
their  quantities,  but  not  their  known  and  readily 
applied  units  of  measure.  And  so  places  and 
periods  have  their  readily  applied  measures,  but 
space  and  time  themselves  are  immeasurable.  And 
so  the  being  of  matter  and  of  mind  must  pre- 
cede questions  of  quantity,  and  a  philosophy  and 
logic  of  being  must  come  before  mathematical 
measuring.  Still  the  construction  of  pure  mathe- 


SYLLOGISTIC   LOGIC.  25 

matical  figure  will  be  found  to  include  the  same 
activities  as  the  clear  apprehension  of  sense-phe- 
nomena, and  thus  among  the  very  first  processes  in 
knowing  both  the  ideal  and  the  real  will  be  the 
use  of  pure  mathematical  constructions  and  intui- 
tions. A  valid  logic  of  mathematics  is  an  essential 
condition  for  a  valid  philosophy. 


II. 

THE    SYLLOGISTIC   LOGIC. 

AN  object  given  in  perception  by  the  various  spe- 
cial senses  takes  on  an  appearance  modified  by 
what  has  been  received  through  each  organ,  and 
the  whole  becomes  an  assemblage  of  different  quali- 
ties, as  if  interpenetrating  each  other  in  the  place 
the  object  occupies,  and  all  go  to  give  the  perma- 
nent characteristics  of  the  known  body.  By  a  larger 
experience,  varied  objects  are  known  as  standing  to 
each  other  in  less  or  greater  resemblance,  and  capa- 
ble of  classifications  according  to  qualified  similari- 
ties. The  great  utility  for  remembering,  describ- 
ing, and  appropriating  these  objects  by  so  classifying 
them,  and  the  interest  in  the  sorting  and  arranging 
of  them  among  each  other  systematically,  early  se- 
cured such  categorical  arrangements,  and  almost 
the  whole  number  of  known  objects  have  their 


26  ABSTEACT    LOGIC. 

assigned  place  in  scientific  catalogues,  ranged  ac- 
cordingly as  their  common  attributes  put  them  in 
their  species  and  rising  genera.  In  this  interest  of 
classifying,  the  Syllogistic  Logic  was  invented,  and 
the  same  sources  of  interest  have  perpetuated  this 
order  of  thinking  with  but  little  improvement  in  de- 
tails since  the  first  production  of  the  logic  by  Aris- 
totle. His  Dialectics,  known  as  First  Philosophy, 
recognized  a  first  mover  and  final  cause,  but  as  possible 
in  thought  rather  than  by  reason's  insight,  and  his 
universal  as  the  ultimate  and  absolute  is  but  the 
Thought  of  Thought,  not  the  "  clearly  seen  Godhead 
in  the  things  that  are  made."  The  logic  of  Aristotle, 
in  his  Organon,  is  solely  a  work  of  the  understanding, 
and  while  the  deductions  and  conclusions  in  syllogistic 
form  are  called  processes  of  "  reasoning,"  yet  does 
the  most  general  judgment  in  any  first  premise  never 
rise  to  a  rational,  but  merely  to  an  empirical  universal. 
The  distinctive  faculty  of  reason  is  never  reached,  nor 
^does  any  part  of  the  logic  strike  root  within  it. 

The  elements  of  which  this  logic  is  constituted 
are  —  1.  Conceptions.  2.  Judgments.  3.  Laws  of 
^thought.  4.  Syllogisms. 

1.  CONCEPTIONS.  —  In  reflection,  the  mind  not  only 
turns  back  upon  an  object  of  sense  as  it  is  remem- 
bered, but  also  carefully  inspects  and  analyzes  it  into 
its  constituent  qualities  and  characteristics,  and  deter- 
mines such  as  in  experience  have  been  found  invaria- 
bly and  permanently  connected  in  it,  and  considers 


SYLLOGISTIC   LOGIC.  27 

such  as  essential  iu  the  nature  of  the  object ;  and  ab- 
stracting these  from  all  casual  and  variable  qualities, 
they  are  taken  as  the  true  and  appropriate  attributes 
of  that  object,  and,  as  so  abstracted,  that  remembered 
perception  is  known  as  a  Conception  —  a  taking  of 
the  permanent  attributes  of  a  thing  together  as  a 
whole.  All  individuals,  having  such  attributes  in 
common,  are  generalized  as  constituting  a  species  ;  and 
the  fewer  attributes  that  are  held  in  common  by  a 
larger  number  are  again  abstracted,  and  being  put  to- 
gether they  make  the  conception  of  a  genus;  and 
such  generalization  may  be  continued  through  rising 
genera,  till  all  attributes  common  to  any  genus  are 
exhausted,  and  the  conception  is  then  known  as  purely 
abstract.  The  attributes  within  the  conception  are 
its  content ;  the  sum  total  of  the  objects  to  which  the 
conception  refers  is  its  extent ;  and  such  objects  are 
subordinate  to  the  conception.  Of  course,  as  the  gen- 
eralization rises,  the  content  diminishes,  and  the  ex- 
tent enlarges.  The  conception  is  identical  when 
taken  in  the  unity  of  its  essential  attributes  ;  contra- 
dictory when  the  conception  is,  and  is  not ;  contrary 
when  some  essential  attributes  antagonize  ;  and  differ- 
ent when  some  attributes  differ  while  others  are  alike. 

2.  JUDGMENTS.  —  An  attribute  taken  from  the 
content,  or  an  object  from  the  extent,  of  a  conception, 
and  joined  to  it  as  qualifying  or  conditioning  it,  raises 
the  conception  to  a  Judgment;  and  as  expressed  in 
terms,  it  is  a  Proposition,  the  conception  being  the 


28  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

subject,  the  qualifying  condition  the  predicate,  and 
the  connecting  verb  is  the  copula.  Fundamental 
Propositions  are  axioms  and  postulates  ;  and  Derivative 
Propositions  are  theorems  and  problems.  Judgments 
have  Quality,  as  affirmative,  or  negative  ;  Quantity,  as 
general,  particular,  and  individual;  Relation,  as  cate- 
gorical, hypothetical,  and  disjunctive;  Mode,  as  prob- 
lematical, assertory,  and  apodictical. 

3.  LAWS  OF  THOUGHT.  —  There  is,  first,  the  Law 
of  Identity,  which  has  a  twofold  meaning,  as  that  of 
affirming  a  thing  solely  as  itself,  and  that  of  whole 
and  all  its  parts  as  being  the  same.  Secondly,  the  Law 
of  Contradiction,  as  negating  that  a  thing  may  be 
other  than  itself,  or  that  whole  and  all  its  parts  may 
be  other  than  the  same.  Thirdly,  the  Law  of  Ex- 
cluded Third  takes  the  laws  of  Identity  and  Contra- 
diction together,  and  requires  that  if  we  think  at  all 
we  must  think  affirmatively  or  negatively,  and  there 
can  be  no  third  way.  Fourthly,  the  Law  of  Sufficient 
Ground  requires  that  all  affirmation  and  negation 
must  have  an  adequate  basis  ;  and  this  is  known  as 
ground  when  sustaining  conviction  directly,  and  as 
consequent  when  conviction  is  sustained  by  deduction 
from  a  prior  ground.  The  logical  ground  is  some 
datum  of  experience,  not  a  necessity  in  reason  above 
experience,  of  which  this  logic  knows  nothing.  These 
laws  rule  in  putting  conceptions  into  judgments,  and 
judgments  into  reasoning  forms,  which  is, — 


SYLLOGISTIC  LOGIC.  29 

4.  THE  SYLLOGISM.  —  Conceptions  contain  the 
permanent  natural  attributes,  which  have  been  ab- 
stracted front  the  analyzed  objects  of  experience,  and 
a  general  conception  includes  all  the  particulars  with 
common  attributes  embraced  by  it,  and  to  them  it  is 
their  Universal.  From  the  Law  of  Identity,  what 
may  be  predicated  of  the  universal  may  be  predicated 
of  all  the  particulars,  inasmuch  as  what  is  true  of  the 
whole  is  true  of  the  parts,  and  so  each  individual,  as 
one  of  the  parts,  is  determined  in  the  universal.  And 
this  determines  the  form  which  a  deductive  syllogism 
must  take.  Some  generic  proposition  must  be  its  major 
premise,  some  one  or  more  of  its  particulars  must  stand 
in  a  proposition  as  the  minor  premise,  and  the  formal 
deduction  of  the  one  individual,  or  more,  must  form  the 
concluding  proposition.  This  syllogistic  formula  ad- 
mits of  three  modifications  —  the  Law  of  Contradic- 
tion determining  in  the  major  premise,  as  affirmatively 
or  negatively  Categorical;  the  Law  of  Sufficient 
Ground,  as  Hypothetical ;  and  the  Law  of  Excluded 
Third,  as  determining  the  Disjunctive.  Each  of  these 
has  its  respective  rules  for  varying  the  order  of 
ground  and  dependence,  with  the  exceptional  forms 
of  Dilemma,  or  horned  syllogism,  Enthymeme,  or  de- 
fective syllogism,  Prosyllogism  and  Episyllogism,  So- 
rites, or  heaped  syllogism,  and  Epichirema,  or  super- 
induced syllogism  in  confirmation. 

Subsidiary  to  the  deductive  mode  of  reasoning,  and 
yet  logically  preliminary  to  it,  is  the  inductive  method, 
and  which  is  used  to  fill  and  confirm  the  generic  or 


80  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

major  premise  by  assuming  an  ultimate  ground  in 
reason,  and  introduces  the  reverse  rule  from  the  de- 
ductive, viz.,  that  what  is  true  of  all  the  particulars 
is  true  of  the  universal ;  and  also  employs  the  reverse 
order  of  thinking  by  determining  the  genus  from  the 
individual.  The  inductive  method  was  largely  elabo- 
rated and  strongly  recommended  by  Lord  Bacon,  in 
his  Novum  Organon,  and  has  been  made  most  admira- 
bly successful  in  physical  discovery.  By  abstractly 
diminishing  the  content,  and  enlarging  the  extent  of 
conceptions,  the  class  might  be  elevated  from  species 
to  rising  genera,  and  at  length  to  a  pure  universal  for 
a  confirmed  major  premise,  if  the  experience  could  be 
carried  out  to  complete  universality.  Such  universal 
experience,  however,  is  impracticable,  and  in  place  of 
it  is  taken  the  rational  principle,  that  Nature  is  uni- 
form in  her  laws  of  progression  and  connection, 
and  that  what  has  been  found  invariably  to  be  fact 
in  broad  inductions  of  experience  may  safely  be 
taken  as  Nature's  law,  and  that  so  induction  care- 
fully and  broadly  applied  may  be  taken  instead  of 
a  universal  experience,  which  is  far  beyond  any  finite 
accomplishment.  Reason  so  helps  the  naturalist  and 
positivist,  even  while  they  are  ignorant  of  any  such 
distinctive  function. 

The  Doctrine  of  Method  here  follows  Syllogistic 
Forms,  and  closes  what  may  be  termed  the  Old  Logic 
by  extending  its  laws  over  the  whole  process  of  contin- 
uous Discourse,  and  the  preparing  the  way  for  Rhetori- 
cal Culture.  The  comprehensive  outline  here  given 


SYLLOGISTIC  LOGIC.  31 

to  the  Old  Logic  will  be  sufficient  for  determining 
whether  any,  and  what  further  use  can  be  made  of  it. 

The  order  of  thought  taken  supposes  the  appear- 
ance in  experience  to  determine  the  conceptions,  arid 
the  sense-objects  to  have  altogether  guided  and  con- 
trolled the  logical  thinking.  Reflection  is  meant  as 
a  retrospection  with  special  care  and  design  to  ana- 
lyze and  abstract  the  permanent  characteristics  of 
observed  facts  as  their  stable  truth,  and  these  are 
made  the  attributes  of  the  steadfast  conceptions.  The 
conceptions,  then,  condition  the  judgments,  and  the 
judgments  regulate  the  syllogisms.  Careful  induc- 
tion from  experience  makes  the  major  proposition  the 
truth  of  experience,  and  the  classified  species  and 
genera  are  the  permanent  order  of  experience,  and 
the  abstractions  taken  from  experience  are  ever  after 
fixed  as  when  they  were  abstracted,  and  as  fixed  facts 
become  also  logical  laws  for  all  coming  experience. 
Nature  is  found  in  experience,  and  no  interest  is  taken 
in  any  question  why  experience  has  been  thus,  but 
the  observed  invariable  order  is  itself  law,  with  no 
quest  for  a  supernatural  law.  Then  the  logical  terms 
hold  the  conceptions  in  their  technical  precision  as 
invariable  in  meaning  as  the  definitions  of  the  Dic- 
tionary. Experience  goes  on  from  year  to  year,  and 
down  through  following  generations,  but  the  order  of 
nature  is  uniform,  and  the  logical  identities  and  con- 
tradictories keep  their  rule  unbroken. 

The  conception  of  the  same  generality  will  keep 
from  age  to  age  the  same  attributes  as  its  content,  and 


32  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

so,  for  example,  man  will  be  sentient  and  mortal  as 
animal,  and  rational  and  responsible  and  immortal 
as  spiritual,  through  all  his  generations.  And  so  all 
the  same  generalized  conceptions  will  have  the  same 
species  and  genera  as  the  logical  extent  through  the 
ages,  and  the  genus  man,  for  instance,  will  have  ever 
out  of  and  beneath  him  the  mineral,  and  vegetable, 
and  animal  kingdoms  as  his  subordinates.  And  even 
the  individual  conceptions  keep  their  perpetual  sun- 
derings  each  from  each,  for  the  limits  of  material 
bodies  are  in  the  bodies  themselves,  and  no  contact 
of  bodies  can  abolish  their  separating  surfaces,  but 
rather  put  another  spacial  limit  between  their  sur- 
faces by  coming  together,  and  thus  all  bodies  make 
and  keep  their  own  places.  The  logical  conceptions 
so  persist,  impervious  in  matter,  and  imperishable  in 
form. 

This  fixed  rigidity  of  the  logical  conceptions  gives 
to  the  logical  system  an  iron  frame,  which  can  neither 
contract  nor  expand  without  breaking.  It  is  exact  in 
testing  immutable  truth,  but  necessarily  introduces 
endless  contradictions  and  absurdities  when  empirical 
facts  are  forced  into  it.  Experience  gives  perpetual 
change  and  movement,  but  its  abstract  representa- 
tives in  the  logical  conceptions  are  changeless  and 
moveless.  The  abstract  conception  of  motion  itself 
holds  it  logically  steadfast,  just  as  the  expressive  pho- 
tograph holds  forever  fixed  the  rapid  light- vibrations. 
Logic  is  unvarying  truth,  and  matter  is  continual  mo- 
tion and  change  ;  hence,  when  logic  and  fact  in  expe- 


k^SlTy 

|NIA. 
SYLLOGISTIC  LOGIC.  33 

rience  are  forced  together,  the  logic  crushes  all  life 
out  of  the  fact,  or  the  living  fact  breaks  the  logic. 
Locomotion  and  change  are  logical  absurdities. 

The  body  cannot  move  where  it  is,  for  it  is  now 
there  ; 

It  cannot  move  where  it  is  not ;  therefore  — 

The  same  body  cannot  move  anywhere ;  and  so  the 
same  thing  cannot  change  its  state  without  violating 
logic  —  for, 

Everything  is  in  one  state  or  another  ; 

If  a  thing  be  in  one  state  it  is  not  changing,  or  if 
in  another  state  it  is  not  changing  ;  —  therefore  — 

The  one  thing  cannot  change  its  state. 

Just  so  with  Kant's  Antinomies,  and  the  many  de- 
tailed absurdities  in  Hansel's  Limits  of  Religious 
Thought,  and  Herbert  Spencer's  "  Unknowables." 
Sir  William  Hamilton  imputes  the  contradictions  to 
our  mental  impotence,  and  endeavors  to  elude  them 
by  most  illogically  laying  down  a  ground  for  faith 
where  there  can  be  no  ground  for  knowledge ;  but 
it  is  not  at  all  mental  impotence,  for  omnipotence 
cannot  make  absurdities  self-consistent.  The  contra- 
dictions and  absurdities  come  necessarily  when  it  is 
attempted  to  put  fleeting  experience  into  fixed  logic. 
Not  the  human  mind  is  at  all  in  fault ;  the  logic  and 
the  experience  are  unequal,  and  any  forcing  of  either 
must  violate  its  integrity. 

With  this  logic,  matter  is  inertia,  and  therefore  if 
it  move  or  change,  its  ground  for  so  doing  must  lie 
quite  out  from  the  logical  conception.  The  change 
3 


34  ABSTRACT  LOGIO. 

from  congelation  to  a  liquid,  and  thence  to  vapor, 
cannot  logically  be  allowed  a  change  in  any  one  thing, 
and  thus  ice,  water,  and  steam  must,  for  this  logic,  be 
each  distinct  in  identity,  according  to  their  respective 
attributes.  These,  as  content,  are  dissimilar  in  the 
three,  and  their  logical  extent  is  also  wholly  unlike : 
the  genus  of  ice  is  crystallization,  of  water  it  is  fluid- 
ity, and  of  vapor  it  is  gas ;  the  logic  thus  cannot  go 
"back  to  a  chemical  substance,  standing  under  the 
three ;  and  if  it  did,  it  would  then  be  forced  to  hold 
the  constituent  hydrogen  and  oxygen  as  two  identi- 
ties which  could  have  no  middle-third.  And  so 
.chemistry  is  perpetually  breaking  logical  law.  Salt 
is  identical  neither  with  acid  nor  alkali,  and  yet  it  is  a 
middle-third;  and  it  has  no  logical  ground,  but  stands 
'in  rational  cause  quite  beyond  all  logical  rules.  The 
-old  logic  can  nowhere  stand  with  chemical  science. 

And  so  all  physical  science  is  breaking  down  logic 
-with  one  hand,  while  holding  on  to  it  for  support  with 
•  the  other.  For  the  physicist  of  the  present  age,  mat- 
ter is  force,  and  the  one  force  is  perpetually  convert- 
ing itself  from  the  simpler  to  the  more  complex  ar- 
rangements, and  the  complex  are  becoming  the  more 
definite  ;  yet  logic  can  tolerate  no  change  in  indenti- 
ties,  nor  allow  any  ground  for  passing  from  homo- 
geneity to  heterogeneity,  and  evolving  the  complex 
from  the  simple.  But  with  the  other  hand,  physical 
science  is  using  all  the  abstract  conceptions  of  species, 
and  rising  grades  of  genera,  and  holding  on  to  both 
logical  content  and  extent  for  its  classifications  and 


SYLLOGISTIC  LOGIC.  35 

systematic  connections.  When  the  higher  abstraction 
comprehends  all  the  objects  of  the  subordinate,  then, 
doubtless,  logic  will  admit  of  a  deduction  of  the 
particular  and  individual ;  but  if  matter  be  an  unsys- 
tematized  Absolute  Force,  this  old  logic  can  allow  it 
to  be  no  ground  for  deducing  either  genus  or  species, 
particular  or  individual. 

Thus,  moreover,  with  Space  and  Time ;  the  old  logic 
can  make  nothing  of  them.  Reflection  and  abstrac- 
tion can  attain  place  and  period  from  appearances  in 
experience,  and  may  put  places  in  juxtaposition  mak- 
ing a  larger  place,  and  periods  in  succession  making 
longer  period,  but  no  extending  of  places  gives  space, 
and  no  succession  of  periods  gives  time,  since  all 
places  must  be  in  space,  and  all  periods  in  time.  So 
is  it  manifest  that  science  and  philosophy  have  out- 
run the  old  logic,  the  vigor  of  which  was  used  and 
spent  in  the  Scholasticism  of  medieval  history.  It 
can  now  have  application  to  only  that  which  is  found 
permanent  in  nature,  viz.,  its  primitive  molecules, 
and  permanent  substances,  and  perpetual  species  and 
genera.  Thought,  and  speculation,  and  science,  and 
history,  and  humanity,  are  advancing,  and  yet  the 
progress  cannot  be  lawless..  A  logic  adequate  to  it 
must  be  attained,  if  the  old  is  to  pass  away.  We  may, 
then,  here,  cheerfully  leave  the  syllogistic  logic,  and 
turn  with  interest  to  see  of  what  logic  the  progres- 
sive age  is  striving  to  avail  itself. 


86  ABSTEACT  LOGIC. 


III. 

TKANSCENDENTAL   LOGIC. 

THE  Old  Logic  had  taken  matter  as  dominant  over 
mind,  and  made  the  object  to  control  the  thought, 
and  jet  this  had  succeeded  so  poorly,  and  its  con- 
tradictions with  experience  had  induced  so  much 
scepticism,  that  it  was  a  matter  of  course  that  some 
clear  and  intrepid  thinker  should  break  away  from 
this  assumption  of  the  object  determining  the  knowl- 
edge, and  assume  the  opposite  supposition,  that  mind 
masters  matter,  and  the  thought  determines  the  ob- 
ject. And  this  is  the  starting-point  of  the  critical 
philosophy  by  IMMANUEL  KANT.  The  shortest'  pos- 
sible, but  still  a  sufficient  outline  for  our  present  pur- 
pose here  follows. 

Back  of  and  conditional  for  all  sense-appearance  are 
the  universal  forms  of  space  and  time,  and  within  these 
all  possible  pure  places  and  periods  may  be  figured. 
There  are  then  postulated  for  thinking  in  judgments 
the  well-known  pure  conceptions  of  the  twelve  cate- 
gories. These  are  the  primitive  forms  for  the  under- 
standing, as  the  pure  intuitions  of  space  and  time  had 
been  for  the  sense.  Any  pure  places  and  periods  in 
space  and  time  might  then  be  taken  within  the  pure 


TRANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  37 

conceptions  of  the  understanding,  and  be  wrought 
into  all  judgments  of  which  the  human  mind  was 
capable,  and  in  this  was  given  a  universal  schema 
for  all  possible  human  thinking.  In  order  to  apply 
this  pure  thinking  empirically,  the  intuitions  mast, 
from  somewhere,  have  content  given  to  them,  and 
such  sense-content  must  be  ordered  in  the  under- 
standing-conceptions ;  and  for  this  empirical  con- 
tent an  outer  thing  in  itself  was  postulated,  though 
this  thing  in  itself  could  not  be  proved  nor  known, 
and  as  an  incognizable  object  was  called  noumenon. 
One  synthetic  "  I  think  "  was  also  postulated  as  able 
to  accompany  every  intuition  as  imagination  and 
every  conception  as  thought,  in  order  to  the  unity  of 
consciousness. 

Such,  substantially,  is  Kant's  Transcendental  Logic  ; 
following  which  is  -his  Transcendental  Dialectic,  , 
disclosing  the  impracticability  of  extending  human 
knowledge  beyond  experience  to  the  attainment  of  an 
existing  soul,  its  immortality,  and  the  being  of  God. 
The  logic  may  regulate  the  thinking  through  its 
empty  forms,  but  there  is  nothing  coming  from  the 
supersensuous  world  to  fill  these  empty  forms  and 
give  a  knowledge  of  any  realities  beyond  sense-ap- 
pearance. Theoretical  Reason  can  do  no  more,  but 
Practical  Reason  postulates  a  soul,  immortality,  and 
Deity,  in  the  interest  of  freedom  and  "  the  categori- 
cal imperative." 

FICHTE  modified  Kant's  Logic,  and  extended  it  in 
one  direction.     He  repudiated  the  noumenon  as  con- 


38  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

fessedly  unknowable,  and  so  necessarily  outside  of  a 
science  of  knowledge  which  must  originate  in  one 
source,  and  be  self-sustained  and  consistent  with  no 
dependence  on  any  outer  support.  Kant  had  ob- 
served that  the  categories  ordered  themselves  in 
triplicates,  the  first  and  second  members  standing 
apparently  in  conflict,  while  the  third  brought  them 
into  reciprocity,  and  of  this  Fichte  took  advantage, 
and  applied  the  principle  of  identity  for  positing  an. 
ego,  or  self,  and  then,  also,  the  principle  of  contradic- 
tion for  positing  over  against  the  ego  its  representative 
as  a  non-ego,  or  not-self ;  and  that  one  should  not 
exclude  the  other  from  consciousness,  he  took  the  self 
and  the  not-self  as  meeting  each  other  in  a  common 
limit,  and  so  in  the  same  ground,  and  therefore  not 
excluding  but  reciprocating  each  other.  One  activity 
both  posited  the  self,  and  opposited  the  not-self  as  its 
representation ;  and  so  the  self  as  subject,  and  the 
not-self  as  object,  were  from  one  and  the  same  source, 
and  were  both  subject  and  object  in  one  act.  This  one 
thinking  activity  is  itself  ultimate,  since  the  deepest 
fact  in  consciousness  is  this  moving  act  in  self-recog- 
nition, and  no  capability  is  found  to  go  back  of  the 
activity  and  attain  a  prior  essence  out  of  which  the 
act  has  come.  The  self  can  be  known  only  through 
its  representing  not-self,  and  the  not-self  can  repre- 
sent the  self  only  as  put  over  against  it  by  the  self- 
activity.  This  living,  thinking  movement  is  the  one 
proper  and  true  self  so  attained  in  consciousness. 
And  now,  on  one  side,  there  is  occasion  that  the 


TKANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  39 

not-self  be  considered  as  active  in  limiting  the  self,  in 
which  case  there  is  an  opening  to  the  Theoretic  Part 
of  the  Logic.  The  thinking  movement  is  in  the  infi- 
nite void,  and  that  it  do  not  spend  itself  uselessly  and 
endlessly,  its  interest  in  its  own  behalf  secures  self- 
limitation,  and  a  return  upon  its  own  activity,  and 
such  limitation  of  its  own  action  becomes  the  spring 
to  all  objective  knowing.  The  universal  world  of 
objects  has  in  this  its  productivity  in  consciousness. 
On  the  other  side,  there  is  occasion  for  the  self  to  be 
taken  as  active  in  this  return,  and  determining  its 
own  being  and  working,  and  so  opening  the  Practical 
Part  of  the  Logic.  The  thinking  ego,  in  the  end  of 
its  own  being,  should  pass  on  to  its  complete  develop- 
ment, and  whatever  it  should  do,  that  also  it  can  do. 
An  intrinsic  imperative  prompts  and  guides,  and  in 
free  spontaneity  the  law  of  order  is  obeyed,  and  full 
development  secured. 

A  defect  in  the  very  root  gave  its  objection  to  the 
logic,  and  secured  its  general  rejection.  It  had  put 
its  standing  at  the  start  really  on  two  principles,  and 
the  inner  self  was  necessarily  in  bondage  to  the  outer 
not-self.  It  might  posit,  but  could  not  know  except 
by  oppositing  its  representing  not-self,  and  thus  could 
never  free  itself  from  the  domination  of  a  not-self. 
It  could  make  no  difference  in  this  respect,  though 
the  self  did  its  own  representing ;  if  it  came  to  self- 
consciousness  at  all,  it  must  opposite,  and  be  controlled 
by,  its  representing  not-self,  and  thus  this-  representa- 
tive object  was  really  as  dominant  as  could  have  been 


40  ABSTEACT  LOGIC. 

any  material  thing  in  itself.  Fichte  had  begun  in 
rejecting  the  noumenon,  but  he  had  finished  by  taking 
in  as  tyrannical  an  eidolon,  and  thus  an  absolute  could 
never  be  gained  in  this  Science  of  Knowledge. 

The  law  of  order  as  sovereign  of  the  thinking,  and 
which  Fichte  affirmed  was  the  only  God  needed,  was 
itself  begotten  from  this  opposited  representative. 
He  had  gone  farther,  but  had  gained  scarcely  any- 
thing more  than  Kant. 

HEGEL  completed  the  Transcendental  Logic.  Profit- 
ing both  from  the  attainments  and  deficiencies  of  his 
predecessors,  he  not  only  dropped  out  Kant's  noume- 
non  and  Fichte's  representative  non-ego,  but  as  pre- 
liminary for  the  construction  of  his  logic  he  attained 
an  assumed  absolute  thought-activity,  ready  at  hand 
for  the  production  of  all  logical  categories  in  their 
primitive  forms  and  relative  order.  This  he  had 
effected  in  his  Phenomenology  of  the  Spirit  by  start- 
ing from  immediate  sensation,  and  exposing  all  rising 
illusions  in  showing  successively  the  only  open  way 
to  the  attainment  of  steadfast  certainty.  Appearances 
taken  immediately  as  true  are  soon  found  fleeting 
and  changing  in  consciousness  through  passing  par- 
ticulars, and  no  abiding  truth  is  taken  except  in  the 
more  general  conceptions  that  remain  when  the  par- 
ticulars disappear. 

In  the  COMMON  CONSCIOUSNESS,  at  its  earliest 
dawning,  we  have  the  apprehension  of  affections  in 
the  special  sense-organs  as  mere  appearance,  and 
the  immediate  assurance  is  only  of  an  indiscriminate 


TRANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  41 

somewhat  of  which  we  can  only  say  "  this,"  and  in 
reference  to  place  can  then  say  u  this  here,"  and  to 
period  "  this  now  ;  "  but  the  vague  "  this  "  anon  be- 
comes a  distinct  perception  with  a  definite  outline,  as 
a  tree  or  a  house  in  place,  or  as  night  in  period,  and 
the  immediate  is  other  and  more  than  the  vague 
"  this,"  even  that  which  can  take  a  common  name  as 
having  already  some  thought  and  meaning  in  it. 
And  yet  this  appearance,  with  a  meaning,  soon  passes 
from  consciousness,  and  another  appearance  with  a 
different  name  and  meaning  comes  in,  and  what  was 
is  not  the  true,  but  we  are  forced  to  find  some  general 
name  which  may  cover  any  appearance  that  is  here 
and  now,  since  that  only  can  be  the  abidingly  true. 
And  even  such  abiding  generality  can  have  its  truth 
only  in  the  conscious  subject  perceiving  it,  and  so  the 
stable  certainty  is  in  the  subject  rather  than  in  the 
object ;  and  then,  to  be  permanently  true,  the  subject 
must  be  general  enough  for  all  the  passing  objects, 
and  therefore  a  general  consciousness  can  alone  be 
the  permanently  true.  The  subject  remains  while 
the  appearances  come  and  go  ;  they  are  varying  acci- 
dents, and  the  true  is  change  in  the  abiding  subject, 
and  this  abiding  subject  cannot  be  immediately  per- 
ceived, and  only  reflectively  thought.  The  true  has 
thus  passed  wholly  away  from  immediate  perception, 
and  can  be  found  only  in  the  reflective  understanding. 
The  subject  here  reflects,  i.  e.,  sends  out,  gives 
utterance  to,  the  appearing  accidents,  and  so  from  it 
is  a  force  which  passes  into  expression  as  manifesta- 


42  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

tion  of  the  internal  and  abiding  subject,  and  at  the 
same  time  is  a  retroactive  limiting  force  sending  the 
phenomenal  accidents  back  to  the  essential  subject  as 
their  true  source,  and  so  in  reflective  thought  this 
counterplay  of  the  forces  is  the  true  activity  which  is 
continually  giving  to  the  thinking  consciousness  mat- 
ter and  form,  cause  and  effect,  substance  and  phe- 
nomenon, internality  and  externality,  &c.  In  truth, 
"  we  'here  get  behind  nature,"  and  see  just  how  the 
thinking  forces  work  to  make  the  consciousness  of 
nature's  connections ;  and  while  the  illusive  under- 
standing perpetually  deceives  with  the  semblance  of 
the  subject  and  object  as  two  distinct  determinations, 
we  now  see  that  they  are  but  two  sides  of  the  one 
reflective  activity,  at  once  outsending  and  remand- 
ing its  own  manifestations.  Beneath  this  deceptive 
and  tumultuous  counterworking  of  the  respective 
forces,  Hegel  aassumes  there  is  "  a  quiet  realm  of 
laws,"  the  steady  image  or  type  of  which  is  constantly 
turned  towards  and  throwing  its  sway  amid  the  per- 
turbations, and  reconciling  all  seeming  absurdities 
and  contradictions.  The  laws  in  particularity  are 
threefold,  viz.,  1.  An  externalizing  impulse.  2.  A 
reverting  impulse  to  the  inner  essential  subject.  3. 
An  internal  coalescing  of  the  two  in  unbroken  union. 
The  comprehension  of  the  first  two  in  the  third  gives 
the  one  "infinitude  of  law,"  and  its  great  significance 
is  manifest  in  his  own  characteristic  description  of  it. 
"It  is  to  be  called  the  simple  essence  of  life  ;  the 
soul  of  the  world ;  the  universal  blood  everywhere 


TBANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  43 

present;  undisturbed  by  any  conflict,  and  itself 
rather  all  contradiction  and  all  reconciliation."  In 
its  sway  the  subject  thinking  has  come  to  see  that  all 
ordered  force  and  change,  action  and  reaction,  are  its 
own  doing.-  Consciousness  has  only  its  own  subject 
as  its  content. 

We  have,  then,  a  second  phase  of  the  true  being 
known  as  •  SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS.  The  same  sway 
from  the  placid  empire  of  law  beneath  is  maintained, 
and  the  activity  posits,  and  negates,  and  coalesces 
these  counteracts  as  before,  but  not  now  as  in  the 
theoretic  common  consciousness,  where  the  object  only 
was  the  true  being,  but  as  practical  self-consciousness, 
where  the  object  is  thought  as  the  subject  itself. 
The  law  here  becomes  a  conscious  urgency  to  the  full 
realization  of  its  self-hood,  in  both  freeing  itself  from 
all  alien  limitation,  and  also  by  standing  out  manifest 
in  its  own  objective  independence.  This  urgency  is 
a  logical  want,  a  thought-appetite,  constraining  to  the 
practical  attainment  of  those  two  ends,  which  indeed 
are  but  the  two  sides  of  the  same  state. 

The  self-consciousness,  though  fairly  thought,  is 
yet  not  practically  attained,  and  there  must  not  re- 
main any  dubious  questionings.  The  doubting  comes 
from  the  logical  law  itself,  which  demands  a  distinc- 
tive counterpart  or  alterum  to  the  posited  subject, 
even  if  the  subject-self  be  all  that  is  true  being  in  the 
consciousness.  From  the  nature  of  the  case,  then, 
the  consciousness  must  be  in  a  •  perpetually  militant 
state,  for  the  self  cannot  assert  and  prove  its  freedom, 


44  ABSTRACT   LOGIC. 

except  by  continual  conflict  and  conquest.  It  must 
have  an  opponent,  and  must  subdue  and  annul  that 
opposition  as  well,  or  its  certitude  of  its  own  free 
being  is  lost.  Here  is  a  life  and  death  struggle,  and 
only  in  perpetuating  the  struggle  is  the  life  persistent. 
One  alien  exterior  after  another  must  be  grappled, 
and  made  pervious  to  its  agency,  and  thoroughly  as- 
similated to  itself  in  its  thought,  and  by  such  logical 
mastication  and  digestion,  the  self  brings  all  that  may 
seem  foreign  into  its  own  subject,  and  shows  itself  both 
the  rightful  owner  and  user  of  nature.  The  urgency 
is  to  overcome  and  win,  that  in  it  its  want  of  full  con- 
sciousness of  independence  in  itself  may  be  satisfied. 

But  the  other  side  of  its  freedom,  the  open  manifes- 
tation of  it,  is  quite  as  urgent,  and  this  cannot  be  in 
conflict  with  and  conquest  over  any  objects  which  are 
destitute  of  self-hood,  and  only  can  be  amid  other 
subjects  with  each  an  independent  self-hood  like  its 
own.  The  one  self  must  stand  in  social  communion 
with  other  selves,  or  he  can  neither  himself  be  fully 
conscious  of  his  own  self-hood,  nor  make  it  extant 
for  others.  But  how  shall  one  only  acting  self-subject 
have  associated  subject-selves  ?  This  can  logically 
be  in  no  other  manner  than  by  conceiving  that  the 
universal  discedes  into  the  particular ;  but  how  this, 
and  yet  the  one  universal  maintain  his  self -hood  and 
the  particulars  have  also  theirs  ?  The  knot  is  cut  and 
covered  by  representing  it  as  "historically"  pre- 
sented. In  some  way,  history  has  found  its  societies 
of  particular  intelligences,  and  though  all  require  in 


TKANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  45 

each  a  self-hood  like  their  own,  yet  have  not  all  come 
alike  to  the  same  cultivated  consciousness  of  their 
free  independence. 

Each  particular  needs  to  arrive  at  the  same  inde- 
pendent self-hood  among  its  fellows  as  amid  the  alien 
sense-objects  around,  but  all  do  not  attain  this  a^ike 
at  the  same  time.  One  asserts  and  maintains  his 
independence  persistently,  and  will  part  with  his 
freedom  for  no  price  ;  another  will  give  in  for  a  con- 
sideration, as  a  hireling  for  a  reward,  and  a  slave 
from  fear.  The  first  will  make  himself  master  of  the 
two,  and  a  fourth  may  freely  yield  his  will  to  the  first 
as  his  friend,  or  in  loyalty  as  his  proper  sovereign. 
Complete  identification  of  will  at  length  in  all  puts 
the  particular  wills  in  one,  and  the  bonds  of  love 
and  virtue  then  hold  together  families,  nations,  and 
humanity.  This  universal  does  not  see  itself  distinct 
from  the  particulars,  but  as  a  whole  with  the  partic- 
ular self-consciousnesses  in  itself,  and  itself  as  recog- 
nized by  all  in  their  wills  identified  as  one.  It  is  true 
personality,  insomuch  as  it  recognizes  itself  as  known 
by  others  in  community.  The  particulars  all  recog- 
nize themselves  to  be  one  in  the  universal,  and  the 
universal  recognizes  each. 

The  coalescing  of  consciousness  and  self-conscious- 
ness gives  the  third  phase  of  true  being  as  ABSOLUTE 
CONSCIOUSNESS,  or  REASON.  All  particular  objectiv- 
ity has  become  suppressed  in  universal  subjectivity, 
which  is  its  own  object.  It  is  thus  both  subject  and 
object,  real  and  ideal,  for  it  is  competent  to  recognize  in 


46  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

itself  all  thinking  and  all  thought.  It  must  still  be  the 
thinking  activity,  for  the  sway  from  the  "  calm  realm 
of  law  "  abides ;  it  must  state  itself  as  its  thought, 
for  there  is  no  true  -being  but  in  its  subject.  Truth 
and  knowledge  are  identical  in  it.  And  herein  is  the 
termination  of  the  Phenomenology  of  spirit,  since  the 
scrutiny  for  lasting  certainty  has  found  all  truth  and 
all  being  in  one  absolute  thinking-activity.  The 
whole  process  becomes  here  a  closed  circle,  whether 
necessarily  or  arbitrarily  may  be  hereafter  seen,  and 
we  have  this  absolute  thinking-reason  as  the  agency 
with  which  Hegel  begins  and  completes  his  transcen- 
dental Logic ;  to  which  we  now  turn  our  investiga- 
tions. 

With  the  foregoing  preparation,  necessary  to  an  in- 
telligent consideration  of  it,  we  now  come  to  Hegel's 
SCIENCE  OF  LOGIC.  An  outline  without  details  is 
sufficient  for  our  purpose,  and  any  adequate  reproduc- 
tion of  it  would  demand  Hegel's  own  presentation. 
The  thinking-activity,  attained  in  the  Phenomenology 
as  the  universally  true  by  dispelling  bit  by  bit  all 
illusion,  is  to  be  the  producing  agency  of  the  logical 
science,  and  this  under  the  perpetual  sway  of  the  trip- 
artite type,  which  the  transcendental  "  infinitude  of 
law  "  constantly  throws  down  upon  the  on-going  pro- 
cess. If  this  attained  thought-activity  be  itself  the 
Absolute  Reason  as  assumed,  or  if,  as  implied  by 
the  presence  and  sway  of  the  transcendental  law,  this 
thought-activity  is  itself  reflective  only,  and  the  law 
controls  as  Absolute  Reason,  we  should  in  either  case 


TRANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC. 

have  already  the  recognition  of  the  distinctive  faculty 
of  Reason,  and  should  have  only  the  critical  inquiry 
to  make,  How  have  we  come  by  it?  But  as  the 
whole  question  of  the  legitimate  possession  of  reason 
is,  we  think,  quite  unsettled  by  the  logic,  we  shall 
leave  its  consideration  for  a  coming  more  appropriate 
position.  The  thought-activity  attained  ultimately  in 
the  Phenomenology  is  taken  primarily  in  the  Logic, 
and  made  author  for  every  stated  thought  produced 
in  the  process.  The  subsistent  law  secures  a  perpetual 
repetition  of  two  simultaneous  counteracts  as  co- 
factors,  or  complementary  elements,  to  be  grasped  to- 
gether in  a  new  and  richer  third,  and  this  third  con- 
ception becomes  a  new  category  at  each  repetition. 
The  last,  also,  admits,  and  the  law  demands  for  it,  an 
analysis  of  new  co-factors  for  a  new  synthesis  in  a 
higher  category.  By  invariable  triplicate  steps  in  a 
circuit,  and  triplicity  of  circuits  in  a  higher  cycle,  the 
Logic  rises  to  a  stage  where  the  process  is  assumed  to 
close  by  shutting  in  upon  itself.  Hegel's  name  for  this 
peculiar  thought-activity  is  "  Begriff,"  which  German 
word  expressively  indicates  its  action  in  the  repeated 
grips  made  of  the  recurring  complementary  elements. 
It  has  been  difficult  to  translate  it  into  a  satisfactory 
English  word  with  the  peculiar  meaning  here  attached, 
and  hence  the  varied  names  given  to  it  as  Notion, 
Idea,  Grasp,  Clinch,  Lock,  Conception,  Comprehen- 
sion, &c. ;  we  shall  therefore  use  it  in  its  vernacular 
sense,  untranslated. 
For  this  "  Begriff,"  there  is  also  placed  at  hand  an 


48  ABSTEACT    LOGIC. 

abstract  conception  sufficiently  general  for  a  continual 
thinking  process,  till  at  least  it  may  reach  the  univer- 
sal of  conscious  experience  if  not  to  an  assumed  ab- 
solute. Abstract  Being  is  a  logical  conception  in 
which  all  content  has  been  exhausted,  but  its  extent 
reaches  to  the  universal  which  has  been  taken  from 
it.  All  sub-genera,  species,  and  particulars,  though 
not  in  it,  are  yet  of  it,  and  may  again  be  thought  as 
identified  with  it.  These,  as  logically  now  standing 
out  of  it,  are  yet  the  counterpart  to  it,  and  constitute 
a  universal  Not-Being  strictly  complementary  with  it. 
As  the  abstract  negative  of  Being,  it  is  the  logical 
converse  of  Being,  and  not  its  opposite  as  a  nihil  nega- 
tivum,  and  may  be  termed  Naught  in  the  same  wav  as 
the  logical  converse  of  abstract  light  is  not-light, 
or  darkness,  and  of  sound  is  not-sound,  or  silence. 
With  the  complementary  conception  of  Being  and 
Naught,  a  universal  logic  is  possible,  having  com- 
pleteness and  exactness  from  one  systematic  activity. 
Here,  then,  is  Hegel's  grand  preliminary  preparation 
for  his  great  work,  and  its  execution  has  been  as  full, 
and  exact,  and  self-consistent,  as  was  the  original  con- 
ception. He  did  all  he  designed,  all  he  deemed  pos- 
sible to  be  done,  not  to  say  all  that  is  really  desirable 
and  needful. 

BEING.  —  Being  and  Naught,  through  beginning 
and  ceasing,  become  determined  existence,  and  stand 
in  combined  position  as  Quality.  Through  the  con- 
tinuous and  discrete  a  quantum  is  attained,  extensive 
in  amount  and  intensive  in  degree,  and  limited  in 


TRANSCENDENTAL   LOGIC.  49 

the  quantitative  ratio  the  Quality  becomes  a  completed 
Quantity.  This,  in  union  with  Quality  as  Quantity 
externally  qualified,  is  Measure. 

ESSENCE.  —  Being  is  now  lost  to  immediate  appear- 
ance, and  can  manifest  itself  only  reflectively,  and  be 
known  not  by  perception,  but  only  in  the  understand- 
ing. The  essential  reflective-force,  as  cause,  expresses 
itself  in  phenomenal  manifestation,  and  the  reciprocity 
of  inner  essence  and  outer  existence  becomes  the  one 
actual  thinking  process.  All  the  illusions  of  the  un- 
derstanding, as  if  matter  and  form,  cause  and  effect, 
substance  and  accidence,  &c.,  were  distinct  determi- 
nations, here  pass  away,  and  Being  and  Essence  stand 
combined  in  the  thinking  agency  alone. 

"  BEGHIFF."  —  The  same  agency  all  along  work- 
ing has  now  come  to  itself,  and  the  category  takes  its 
proper  name.  The  process  is  still  under  the  same 
transcendent  law,  and  so  after  the  same  trilogic 
method.  The  "  Begriff"  has  its  inner  subjective  work- 
ing, giving  to  itself  a  complete  internal  logic ;  also 
a  full  external  order  of  determination  in  mechanism, 
chemism,  and  teleology,  as  an  objective  activity.  The 
combination  of  the  subjective  and  objective  brings  the 
"  Begriff "  into  entire  self -identity.  Yet,  as  one  in 
thought  and  act,  the  counter-acts  still  proceed  to  fur- 
ther attainments.  The  urgency  to  think,  and  the 
theoretic  thinking,  combined,  enter  the  stage  of  prac- 
tical activity  as  life  ;  the  longing  and  knowing  con- 
stitute the  good  in  thought,  and  put  in  execution  they 
become  will.  The  good  is  yet  in  thought,  and  so  pro- 
4 


50  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

spective,  and  the  will  is  not  for  that  which  yet  is,  but 
which  is  to  be  ;  an  infinite  seeking  of  an  infinite 
good  ;  the  struggle  can  cease  in  quiet  serenity  only  as 
the  good  is  perpetually  known  and  perpetually  pos- 
sessed ;  in  this  the  "  Begriff"  is  Absolute — self-liv- 
ing, self-knowing,  and  ever  self-blessed.  Having 
found  itself  in  intrinsic  unity,  internal  determining  is 
dismissed  in  self-liberation,  and  this  dismissed  totality 
of  outer  determinations  is  then  the  external  world  of 
Nature. 

THE  SCIENCE  OF  NATUEE  here  follows  the  Logic, 
and  takes  this  negative  externality  as  a  one-sided 
•state  of  existence  disceded  from  the  internal,  and  the 
process  of  its  return  to  unity  with  the  internality  is 
minutely  described.  The  design  of  this  is,  that  in 
thinking  itself  externally  the  "  Begriff,"  may  perfect 
the  knowing  internally.  Internality  and  externality 
-are  one  in  universal  thought  —  the  discession  to  ex- 
ternality, with  its  negative  determinations,  is  Nature 
•in  infinite  particularity  —  the  science  of  this  is  the 
'•process  of  identifying  the  particulars  in  individuality 
—  the  thinking-activity  is  thus  present  in  the  entire 
•determinations  of  Nature. 

At  first,  Nature  presents  a  chaos  of  particulars, 
"but  it  is,  notwithstanding,  a  living  universal.  Ab- 
stract externality  is  Space  —  the  abstraction  of  nega- 
tive thought-determinations  in  it,  inducing  abstract 
instants  and  moments,  is  Time.  The  unity  of  instant 
and  moment  is  place  ;  and  the  activity  thus  uniting  is 
motion  ;  and  the  combination  of  space  and  motion  is 


TRANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  51 

matter,  as  position  taken.  Hence  successive  determi- 
nations in  free  movement  go  on  in  absolute  Mechanics. 
The  working  out  of  the  general  individuality  of  the 
worlds,  the  particulars  in  them,  and  their  complete  in- 
dividuality determined,  make  physical  science.  Free 
individuality,  then,  gives  life  in  Organics,  as  geologic 
shaping,  vegetable  particularizing,  and  animal  individ- 
ualizing in  determined  subjects.  An  incapacity  to 
become  generic,  and  go  on  to  the  universal,  is  the 
wasting  mortality  of  individuals,  and  their  bodily 
death  is  the  spiritual  resurrection  and  immortality 
of  Mind. 

THE  SCIENCE  OF  MIND  here  follows,  and  is  a  so- 
lution of  all  contradictions  between  the  external  and 
internal,  since  Mind  unites  all  in  thought,  and  is  both 
subject  and  object,  self-dependent,  arid  therein  sub- 
stantial freedom,  and  in  this  it  is  Subjective  Mind. 
This  free  individuality,  then,  manifests  itself  in  its 
activity,  gets  and  holds  property,  makes  contracts, 
knows  rights  under  the  form  of  legality,  and  is  thus 
ethical  personality  as  manifested  Objective  Mind. 
Free,  practical  thought,  self-directed  to  ends,  be- 
comes morality  ;  and  this  in  identity  with  general  will 
is  absorption  in  family  society  and  state,  and  becomes 
Absolute  Mind,  having  the  beautiful  in  Art,  object  of 
faith  and  worship  in  Religion,  and  thinking  and 
thought  in  Philosophy. 

And  now  this  short,  but  still  sufficient  notice  of  the 
Transcendental  Philosophy  will  enable  us  fairly  to 
estimate  its  value,  by  determining  both  its  excellences 


52  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

and  deficiencies.  The  Phenomenology  dropped  off  all 
sense-affections,  and  retained,  as  the  permanently 
true,  only  the  conscious  thought-activity.  This  oc- 
casioned a  concentrated  attention  upon  the  thought- 
process,  which  made  clear  what  had  before  been  but 
vaguely  recognized  —  that  affirmation  was  at  the 
same  time  a  negation  of  the  other  of  what  was  af- 

O 

firmed  ;  and  this  again  was  two  counter-acts  together, 
one  affirming  a  matter,  and  the  other  denying  its  al- 
ternate ;  and  then  again,  that  this  negating  the  alte- 
rum  was  negating  a  negation,  and  so  making  the 
double-negative  to  be  a  true  affirmative,  and  thereby 
combining  the  two  as  complementary  elements  in  a 
new  third  conception  made  up  from  both.  In  this 
method  of  procedure  there  was  seen  at  once  a  logical 
process  transcending  the  old,  the  activity  making  the 
logic  and  determining  the  thought,  and  not  as  be- 
fore, where  the  appearance  was  the  object  and  that 
determined  the  logic. 

An  exclusive  interest  in  the  new  facts,  and  a  fond 
conviction  that  true  philosophy,  and  so  also  a  true 
logic  must  spring  from  one  source,  and  stand  on  one 
principle,  in  order  to  become  a  complete  self-consist- 
ent system,  induced  the  discarding  of  what  was  quite 
true  in  the  old  logic,  that  there  were  opposites  which 
could  not  be  combined  in  any  middle-third,  and  so 
constructing  a  logic  altogether  made  up  of  middle- 
thjrds.  The  result  has  been  a  large  extension  of  valid 
thought  quite  beyond  the  old,  but  with  a  needless 
loss  of  much  truth  which  was  in  the  old.  The  tran- 


TRANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  53 

scendentalist  will  have  everything  come  from  his  one 
acting  "  Begriff,"  and  logical  thought  must  be  in  this 
way  ever-flowing,  while  the  old  was  ever-standing ; 
yet  past  contradiction  the  truth  of  experience  is, 
some  things  permanently  "  stand,"  and  some  other 
things  ceaselessly  u  flow."  Within  the  moving  pro- 
cess, however,  all  is  new  acquisition,  and  the  tran- 
scendental thinking  is  clear,  exact,  and  self-consistent, 
and  its  attainments  irresistibly  valid.  There  may, 
perhaps,  be  occasionally  a  resuming  of  some  rejected 
incertitudes,  as  forces  and  appetitive  impulses  be- 
yond what  can  be  legitimately  derived  from  mere 
thought-activity ;  yet,  substantially,  the  thinking  is 
held  strictly  within  its  logical  domain.  If  all  needed 
were  fairly  included  in  the  logical  method,  its  validity 
might  satisfy  our  conviction.  But  its  deficiency  must 
leave  a  comprehensive  inquiry  unsatisfied.  We  must 
push  it  bej^ond  its  limits,  or  force  more  into  it  than 
belongs  there,  or  some  unsupplied  wants  will  remain 
that  will  prove  quite  intolerable.  The  following  will 
give  a  clear  recognition  of  the  more  important  de- 
fects. 

1.  The  logic  is  not  self-developed  thought,  but  a  man- 
ifest out-groivth  from  experience.  —  It  assumes  that  the 
thought-process  is  absolute,  and  produces  all  its  stated 
thought  from  within  itself,  and  is  both  self-moving 
and  thought-originating ;  and  so  much  a  satisfactory 
speculative  Philosophy  must  some  way  ultimately  at- 
tain, but  so  much  is  by  no  means  attained  in  the  He- 
gelian Logic.  It  fairly  transcends  the  old  logic,  and 


54  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

coalesces  in  a  middle-third,  where  the  old  denies  the 
possibility  of  any  middle-somewhat ;  but  the  agency 
accomplishing  the  work  is  not  adequate  to  it  in  its 
own  unassisted  efficiency.  It  will  be  utterly  helpless 
if  left  to  its  own  resources.  A  careful  illustration  of 
the  process,  by  first  following  it  out  in  lower  abstract 
forms  of  universality  after  the  same  method  as  its 
own,  will  both  reveal  the  point  of  its  superiority  to 
the  syllogistic  logic,  and  the  point  of  its  deficiency  in 
itself,  both  as  to  what  it  assumes  and  what,  indeed, 
speculation  must  require  of  it. 

The  old  logical  rule  of  contradiction  holds  ever  valid 
between  opposite  conceptions.  Of  two  universal  op- 
posites  the  truth  must  be  with  one  or  the  other,  and 
there  can  be  no  middle-third.  But  a  generalized  con- 
ception, from  which  all  content  has  been  abstracted, 
may  be  set  over  against  its  abstract  extent,  and  the 
two  will  not  be  opposites,  but  counterparts  of  each 
other,  and  such  counterparts  may  be  combined  in  a 
third-somewhat,  and  of  such  cases  the  transcendental 
logic  legitimately  avails  itself,  and  its  method  is  with 
such  only.  We  furnish  examples  from  any  cases  of 
completely  generalized  abstractions  of  the  special 
senses. 

The  sense  of  vision  will  have  its  most  generalized 
being  in  the  conception  of  pure  light,  and  that  of 
hearing  its  most  generalized  being  in  the  conception 
of  unvarying  sound,  and  so  of  all  sense  organs.  The 
purely  abstract  in  the  special  sense  has  all  attributes 
taken  from  within  and  put  as  outside  species  and 


TRANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  55 

genera,  and  we  then  logically  say  of  such  conception 
that  it  is  void  of  Content,  but  universal  in  Extent. 
The  abstract  for  vision  is  pure  light,  and  for  hearing 
is  pure  sound,  and  in  each  case  respectively  there  is 
void  content  with  universal  extent.  Pure  light  has 
no  attributes  as  predicates  within,  but  they  are  absent 
as  logical  extent  without,  and  the  two  are  counter- 
parts of  the  one  generalized  conception.  One  is  Ab- 
stract Light,  the  other  Abstract  not-Light,  or  Dark- 
ness. They  are  really  complementary  each  to  each, 
and  there  can  be  no  judgment  conceived  by  either 
alone,  for  the  counter  reasons  that  one  is  subject  void 
of  predicates,  and  the  other  is  absent  predicates  from 
their  subject.  Abstract  the  subject,  pure  Light,  and 
there  is  only  empty  organ,  and  so  utterly  nothing. 
Darkness  is  not  logically  absence  of  light,  but  light 
with  absent  predicates ;  and  so  of  hearing,  silence  is 
not  absent  sound,  but  sound  with  all  attributes  ab- 
sent. 

The  old  logic  would  rule  light  and  darkness,  sound 
and  silence,  as  logical  opposites,  and  deny  any  mid- 
dle-third between  them  ;  the  transcendental  logic 
rules  them  to  be  complementary  counterparts  and  co- 
factors,  which,  though  analytically  parted  in  thought, 
are  but  the  two  sides,  as  logical  content  and  extent, 
of  the  same  conception,  and  may  blend  in  a  middle- 
third  as  light  and  shade,  sound  and  silence.  Nothing 
can  be  perceived  in  either  pure  light  or  unvarying 
sound  any  more  than  in  utter  darkness  or  silence,  but 
when  a  shade  comes  within  the  light,  or  a  lull  within 


56  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

the  dull  sound,  at  once  we  begin  seeing  and  hearing. 
The  important  note  here  to  be  taken  is,  that  no  pos- 
sible combinations  can  be  found  but  in  just  these  con- 
ceptions of  complementary  co-factors.  Silence  will 
not  blend  with  light,  nor  darkness  with  sound,  nor 
any  better  can  the  emptiness  of  a  void  organ  give 
blended  light  and  shade,  or  sound  and  silence.  We 
must  have  the  complementary  counterparts,  or  we 
cannot  work  the  transcendental  logical  method.  But 
with  these,  logic  can  at  once  begin  its  syntheses,  and 
think  Being  to  become  Quality,  Quantity,  and  Meas- 
ure, and  the  thought-process  may  run  through  all  the 
determinations  of  all  the  categories.  Any  one  special 
sense,  taken  as  an  abstract  universal,  gives  occasion 
for  the  full  logic. 

Hegel  has  taken  a  generalization  inclusive  of  all 
pure  sense,  sight,  hearing,  touch,  taste,  and  smell,  in 
one  universal  subject,  as  "  Being,"  and  thus  his 
"Naught"  must  be  the  universal  abstract  counter- 
part as  the  logical  extent  of  the  pure  Being,  only  in 
which  conception  can  the  positive  and  negative  co- 
factors  be  made  to  coalesce  as  is  the  necessity  of  his 
method.  Were  his  Naught  an  utterly  nihil  negativum, 
he  could  never  effect  a  single  synthesis,  nor  have 
opened,  in  the  two  sorts  of  "  becoming  "  in  the  ceas- 
ing and  beginning,  the  determining  movements  be- 
tween Being  and  Naught,  which  only  can  start  in 
their  complementary  unity.  We  cannot  even  in 
thought  progress  from  nothing  to  something,  nor  can 
we  attain  any  truth  by  beginning  at  utter  falsehood. 


TRANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  57 

What  we  determine  by  either  the  Syllogistic  or  Tran- 
scendental Logic  must  be  already  involved  in  our  gen- 
eralized conception,  either  as  content  or  extent.  The 
merited  glory  of  Hegel  is  in  finding  the  complemen- 
tary co-factors  which  may  combine  in  negative  uni- 
ties, viz.,  Being  and  Naught,  as  strictly  logical  coun- 
terparts, and  not  that  his  thinking-process  could  be 
made  creative.  This  abstract  pure  Being,  general- 
ized from  experience  even  by  the  old  logic,  was  as 
primitively  necessary  for  him  as  was  for  Kant  the 
"  thing  in  itself,"  and  for  the  same  purpose. 

If  then  there  were  granted  for  the  thought-activity 
what  is  claimed  for  it,  that  it  is  "  a  living  movement," 
it  could  not  be  author  of  an  absolute  logical  process, 
for  it  can  develop  nothing  from  its  own  activity,  and 
only  evolve  just  what  a  generalized  experience  has 
already  put  within  the  abstract  pure  Being,  and  its 
abstract  counterpart  the  universal  Naught.  There 
must  be  an  absolute  author  of  both  universal  thought 
and  thing,  but  the  "Begriff "  is  no  independent  au- 
thor of  even  universal  thinking. 

2.  Hegel's  reason  is  ever  ambiguous.  —  Kant  recog- 
nized a  special  function  for  reason,  and  considered  it 
as  a  higher  form  of  the  understanding.  It  sought  to 
know  God,  the  soul,  and  immortality,  as  it  knows 
nature.  For  knowing  nature  there  was  a  presupposed 
noumenon,  or  "  thing  in  itself,"  which  filled  the  sense- 
intuitions,  and  then  replenished  also  the  understand- 
ing-conceptions, but  for  the  reason  there  could  be 
found  no  such  supply,  and  thus  for  the  human  mind 


58  ABSTKACT  LOGIC. 

all  thought  about  supersensual  objects  was  empty  and 
vain,  for  they  never  come  within  any  sense-experience. 
But  the  Kantian  Theoretical  Reason  was  not  ambig- 
uous ;  it  regulated  the  process  towards  the  supernat- 
ural, but  was  insufficient  to  reach  to  it. 

Fichte,  also,  philosophically  posited  an  ego  on  the 
principle  of  identity,  and  a  non-ego  representative  of 
the  ego  on  the  principle  of  contradiction,  and  thus  the 
subject  ego  could  know  as  object  the  representative 
non-ego,  and  in  this  representative  mode,  Fichte  could 
expound  both  his  theoretical  and  practical  knowing ; 
but  he  was  obliged  to  admit  that  the  Absolute  was 
beyond  knowledge,  except  as  a  transcendental  "  law 
of  order;"  but  there  was  nothing  ambiguous,  and 
merely  imbecility  of  faculty. 

Schelling,  too,  whose  logic  we  have  passed  as  it 
was  superseded  by  Hegel's,  had  his  "  identity  doc- 
trine," that  subject  and  object  were  one  and  the  same 
in  the  Absolute,  and  were  thought  to  be  distinctive 
polar  potencies  sent  off  by  one  throb  "of  the  Abso- 
lute ;  but  he  found  it  impossible  to  think  this  Ab- 
solute to  stand  in  Consciousness,  and  could  know 
it  only  through  an  inexplicable  "  intellectual  intui- 
tion; "yet  was  nothing  here  ambiguous,  but  incon- 
ceivable. 

Jacobi,  as  a  Kantist,  denied  the  possibility  of  know- 
ing God  through  human  faculties,  yet  gave  to'  reason 
a  belief  in  God  for  all  practical  purposes,  and  thus 
there  was  a  ground  for  faith,  but  not  for  knowledge  ; 
and  in  this  was  no  ambiguity. 


TRANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  59 

But  Hegel's  logic  is  an  assumed  elevation  of  the 
thinking  "  Begriff,"  and  extension  of  it  over  to  Abso- 
lute Reason  itself,  and  yet  keeps  with  and  in  it  the 
same  "  universality  of  law  "  and  method  of  working, 
as  reason,  which  it  had  as  antecedent  thinking-ac- 
tivity. Originally  in  its  incipient  action  it  is  ambigu- 
ous in  that  it  perpetually  moves  in  double-acts,  and 
never  stands  without  its  counterpart  relations.  At 
the  same  time  it  posits  it  also  negates,  and  at  the  time 
it  combines  in  synthesis  it  opens  in  a  new  analysis. 
Such  is  its  normal  method  of  working,  and  the  in- 
venting and  persistent  pursuit  of  this  order  of  move- 
ment is  the  transcendentalisms  grand  excellency  and 
merit.  Its  ambiguity  as  combining  in  logical  judg- 
ments is  no  delusion,  but  a  perfectly  trustworthy 
form  of  carrying  universal  Being  and  Naught  through 
the  whole  categorical  process.  But  it  assumes  at 
length  to  become  sole  subject  and  object  in  one ;  to 
be  universal  knower  and  known,  Absolute  Reason  in 
its  own  right  and  self-sufficiency ;  and  here  the  am- 
biguity it  still  keeps  is  an  intolerable  contradiction 
and  absurdity.  Double-action  here  is  duplicity  that 
deludes  and  deceives,  and  cannot  be  permitted,  and  ' 
yet  this  ambiguity  stands  in  every  phase  of  the  Reason. 
We  refer  here  as  evincive  of  this  deceptive  ambi- 
guity to  three  of  the  most  prominent  exhibitions 
made  of  the  ultimate  reason-action. 

i.  As  the  final  reconciling  law  of  all  ambiguity  in 
the  understanding.  In  the  phase  of  common  con- 
sciousness, in  the  Phenomenology,  there  is  exhibited 


60  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

the  perplexity  arising  from  the  double-play  of  the 
forces  in  the  understanding,  and  intended  relief  is  af- 
forded by  assuming  that  we  get  "  upon  the  back-side 
of  Nature,"  and  there  see  that  what,  on  the  fore-side, 
seem  to  be  two  activities  making  matter  and  form, 
cause  and  effect,  to  be  two  distinct  determinations, 
really  is  but  a  double  mode  of  one  action,  positive 
on  one  side,  and  at  the  same  time  negative  on  the 
other.  Here  we  want  the  double  understanding- 
play,  and  are  not  deluded  when  we  stand  where  we 
see  the  two  sides  of  the  one  action.  But  right  here 
we  have  opened  beneath  us  the  "  supersensual  world  " 
as  a  u  quiet  realm  of  law,"  turning  its  eternal  type 
and  image  into  human  experience,  and  regulating  the 
"  weaving  web  "  just  as  the  pattern-card  over  the 
warp  of  the  carpet-loom  regulates  the  figure  while  the 
woof  is  passing  in,  and  here  as  ultimate  reason  and 
rule,  we  can  tolerate  no  ambiguous  movement ;  and 
yet  here  in  this  highest  point  of  sovereignty,  it  is  still 
a  law  disceding  into  particularity,  and  then  coalescing 
into  an  "infinitude  of  law,"  and  just  as  ambiguous 
in  its  own  movement  as  in  the  thinking  it  is  guiding. 

ii.  In  the  attainment  of  self-consciousness  by  the 
reason.  When,  again  in  the  Phenomenology,  free- 
thought  has  mastered  nature,  and  brought  physical 
phenomena  to  be  intelligible,  and  must  now  attain  its 
own  conscious  independence,  and  this  can  be  effected 
only  in  communion  with  others  of  its  own  kind,  the 
necessity  then  arises  for  the  universal  activity  to 
discede  into  particulars,  and  each  particular  to  both 


TRANSCENDENTAL  LOGIO.  61 

know  all  and  be  known  by  all  as  thinking  agency, 
and  that  all  come  in  thought  at  length  to  universal 
unison,  —  such  unison  of  thought  is  taken  to  be  sub- 
stantial unity  of  will,  and  therein  a  universal  person- 
ality. The  particular  personalities  began  as  sense-ex- 
perience did,  pre-historically  and  so  inexplicably,  and 
the  consummated  unity  of  personality  is  in  universal 
humanity  ;  and  so,  where  we  must  demand  an  Absolute 
Reason,  originating  and  consummating  action  from  its 
own  behest  and  self-arbitrament,  we  have  a  universal 
thinking  itself  into  particulars,  and  then  combining 
the  several  particulars  in  joint  universality  as  one 
Personal  Absolute  Reason. 

iii.  In  the  assumed  dosing  of  the  circle  of  the  thought- 
process  in  Absolute  Reason,  the  necessary  ambiguity  still 
continues.  The  Logic  closes  in  Thought  as  the  high- 
est good,  not  attained  but  eternally  attainable,  and 
so  Reason  is  contemplated  as  self-living,  self-blessed, 
absolute  fulness.  We  anticipate  and  demand  hence- 
forth for  the  Reason  a  life  and  activity  solely  in  the 
end  of  its  own  excellency,  and  answering  only  to 
what  is  known  as  due  to  its  own  dignity.  Yet  we 
find  this  Absolute  Reason  urged  on  still  by  the  same 
old  triplicate  positing,  negating,  and  re-combining ; 
pushing  its  agency  into  externality  and  working  out 
Nature ;  arid  working  Spirit  from  Nature ;  and  then 
Spirit  into  congenial  society  and  state  regularity,  and 
thus  as  Universal  Mind  coming  to  know  itself  better 
as  object  of  Beauty  in  Art,  Worship  in  Religion,  and 
Eternal  Truth  in  Philosophy.  And  the  law  is  still 


62  ABSTKACT   LOGIC. 

upon  it  that  it  may  no  more  cease  than  at  its  be- 
gining,  for  its  Infinity  is  but  the  potentiality  of  an 
endless  series,  with  no  other  freedom  than  persistent 
unhindered  movement  and  change.  It  presents  a 
mode  of  endless  motion,  and  the  modifier  of  the  mode 
is  ultimately  held  to  the  same  method  in  the  "  infini- 
tude of  Law."  The  last  word  is  still  Ambiguity  of 
Activity.  The  conception  is  insufficient  for  Absolute 
Law,  Absolute  Person,  Absolute  Freedom.  Propos- 
ing it  as  satisfactory  end  is  but  amusing  the  imagi- 
nation while  deluding  the  intellect. 

3.  The  universality  of  thought  is  empirical,  not  abso- 
lute, and  can  give  no  ultimate  rule  for  morality.  —  Kant 
recognized  in  humanity  the  consciousness  of  an  irre- 
pressible claim,  and  though  theoretically  inexplica- 
ble, was  utterly  inseparable  from  the  conviction  of 
human  freedom,  which  claim  was  an  enjoined  ought 
that  unconditionally  must  be  obeyed,  and  which  ir- 
revocable obligation  he  termed  the  "  categorical  im- 
perative." It  was  ultimate  rule,  though  coming  from 
an  indeterminate  source,  and  to  give  it  intelligent 
practical  application,  he  expressed  it  nearly  after  the 
manner  of  the  Gospel  Golden  Rule,  viz.,  "  Act  as  if 
the  maxim  of  thy  will  were  to  become  an  universal 
law  of  nature  through  thy  adoption  of  it."  And 
Fichte  also  recognized  a  transcendental  "  law  of 
order  "  which  man  was  conscious  ought  to  be  obeyed, 
and  therefore  could  be ;  and  this  was  for  him  ground- 
for  both  morality  and  piety,  and  as  categorically  im- 
perative as  in  Kant's  Practical  Reason.  Neither  had 


TBANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  63 

recognized  in  reason  itself  a  ground  of  obligation,  but 
both  could  inculcate  an  immutable  morality. 

But  Hegel's  ultimate  rule  is  a  logical  law  taken 
from  the  experience  of  universal  humanity,  and 
though  it  be  admitted  effectually  to  control  cannot 
ethically  bind  either  the  particular  or  the  universal. 
The  ultimate  good  is  thought-activity,  and  its  sub- 
stance is  in  universal  thinking-humanity.  The  think- 
ing-activity can  come  to  self-conscious  independence, 
and  so  be  self-sufficient  Reason,  in  no  way  but  by 
thinking  in  communion  with  others,  and  never  in 
solitary  cogitation.  Hence  the  necessity  for  the  one 
thought-movement  to  discede  into  particular  activities, 
and  these  particulars  must  think  among  themselves  in 
communion,  and  so  one  must  know  each  and  each 
must  know  all  as  thinking-activities,  and  then  the 
particulars  must  recombine  in  universal  thought- 
agreement.  The  necessary  process  is,  to  induce  each 
particular  to  make  thought  the  end  of  action  and 
live  in  obeying  the  thinking  impulses,  and  this  iden- 
tification of  thinking  and  action  is  unison  of  thought 
and  will,  and  so  secured  in  the  particulars  it  becomes 
a  substantial  totality  as  accordant  thought  and  will  in 
universal  personality.  Thinking  humanity  so  comes 
into  full  self-consciousness,  and  thereby  becomes  sub- 
stantially one  thinking  Person,  and  the  logical  truth 
literally  is,  "  the  will  of  the  people  is  the  will  of 
God."  The  rule  of  thought  can  tolerate  no  activity 
outside  the  sway  of  logical  law,  and  equal  and  exact 
justice  stands  in  the  one  issue,  that  every  man  think 


64  ABSTEACT  LOGIC. 

as  all  think,  and  that  each  execute  his  thought  in  a 
manner  that  violates  no  other's  thinking,  and  no 
man's  thought  and  will  can  have  freedom  except  in 
such  universal  concordance.  Any  thought  in  collis- 
ion with  the  universal  comes  thereby  necessarily  into 
helpless  restriction  and  hopeless  bondage.  The  expe- 
rience of  all  the  particulars  gives  a  universal  experi- 
ence, but  in  practical  operation  the  accordance  must 
be  in  the  more  limited  communities  of  family,  social 
neighborhood,  and  especially  state-regulation  and 
national  sovereignty.  Within  the  community  the 
prevalent  thought  and  will  is  ultimate  umpire. 

J.  H.  Sterling  has  made  a  masterly  presentation  of 
Hegel's  "  Science  of  Right "  in  his  Edinburgh  Lec- 
tures on  the  Philosophy  of  Law.  The  object  of  a 
Science  of  Right  is  affirmed  to  be,  "  The  human  will, 
with  special  reference  of  the  particular  to  the  uni- 
versal will ; "  and  he  assumes  that  there  is  free-will 
only  as  it  hears  and  implicitly  obeys  the  universal, 
let  the  interest  of  the  particular  be  what  it  may. 
He  illustrates  by  a  special  striking  example  how 
individual  thought  and  will  may  be  absorbed  and 
disappear  in  the  universal. —  "  There  are  times  when 
such  disappearance  becomes  the  one  historical  fact. 
During  the  French  Revolution  it  was  the  universal 
of  will  alone  functioned.  Every  particular  accord- 
ingly was  nought  —  even  the  particulars,  particular 
after  particular,  then  and  there  suggested  —  and 
madness  ruled  the  hour,  destruction  was  the  lord  of 
all.  Not  a  single  particular,  not  one  difference  could 


TRANSCENDENTAL   LOGIC.  65 

be  tolerated,  whether  rank,  or  birth,  or  fortune,  or 
talent,  or  virtue,  or  even  beauty.  That  will  can 
withdraw  itself  into  the  abstract  universal  and  be- 
come actively  the  universal  void,  is  here  evident,  just 
as  it  is  evident  that  it  can  become  also  —  in  the  wor- 
ship of  Brahma,  for  example —  the  passive  void." 

Perhaps  a  stronger  example  of  the  fact  of  merging 
particular  thought  and  will  in  the  universal  can 
nowhere  else  be  found  than  in  this  frenzy  of  the 
French  Revolution,  and  surely  no  clearer  instance 
need  be  asked  for  the  utter  inadequacy  of  taking  an 
empirical  universal  for  an  ultimate  moral  rule.  How 
little  particular  freedom,  how  horrible  the  public 
wickedness,  when  this  "  madness  ruled  "  and  u  de- 
struction was  lord !  "  How  terribly  manifest  was  it 
here  made,  that  instead  of  holding  universal  thought 
and  will  to  be  ultimate  moral  rule,  the  moral  must 
itself  be  over  the  universal  empirical  thought,  and 
that  it  cannot  be  sufficient  that  the  universal  will  be 
one,  and  that  be  known,  but  that  also  it  must  be 
known  by  every  man  to  be  right  before  he  can  ethi- 
cally be  allowed  to  adopt  it.  In  Hobbes's  Leviathan 
the  civil  sovereignty  is  made  absolute,  and  in  Hegel's 
Science  of  Right  the  prevalent  universal  thought  and 
will  is  supreme,  but  no  age  has  wanted  its  particular 
examples  of  moral  heroes  who  have  met  persecution 
and  martyrdom  for  individual  conscience'  sake,  and 
been  approved  and  applauded  by  the  wisest  and  best 
of  all  succeeding  generations  for  holding  fast  to  pri- 
vate conviction  in  the  face  of  popular  sentiment.  Not 
5 


66  ABSTRACT   LOGIC. 

logical  rule  for  accordant  thought,  but  rational  insight 
of  what  is  morally  due,  must  stand  imperative  for  in- 
dividual conduct,  no  matter  what  the  thought  and  will 
of  the  empirically  universal.  There  is  a  point  for  at- 
taining to  Absolute  Universality,  and  determining  not 
merely  how  some  or  all  men  think  and  will,  but  how 
some  and  all  must  think  and  will  to  attain  ultimate 
approbation.  The  Hegelian  Universality  is  the  ab- 
stract thinking  humanity  ;  and  the  universal  must  be 
as  the  particulars  are,  discordant  if  the  particulars  dis- 
agree, illogical  if  the  particulars  break  logical  rules, 
even  defunct  or  dormant  if  the  particulars,  as  some  do, 
become  dead  or  unconscious.  The  universal  lives  only 
:in  the  particulars,  arid  is  as  the  particulars,  and  at 
best  it  is  only  thinking  humanity,  for  the  only  activity 
;is  thought-activity.  Thought  and  will  are  one  and 
the  same,  and  the  only  freedom  known  is  unhindered 
spontaneity  of  perpetual  positing,  negating,  and  re- 
uniting in  ascending  categories.  Admit  such  a  con- 
trolling inward  impulse  to  perpetual  thinking,  and  the 
thought-process  may  be  persistently  continuous  and 
invariably  within  the  logical  law,  but  this  would  be 
merely  appetitive  in  intellectual  gratification,  not  at 
,all  imperative  in  the  end  of  moral  approbation. 

4.  These  thinking-particulars  in  universality  could 
have  neither  communion,  nor  a  common  space  and  time, 
in  human  experience.  —  The  entire  activity  here  is 
thinking,  the  whole  productivity  is  thought.  What- 
ever religious  views  there  may  be  entertained  about 
spiritual  communications  and  divine  inspiration,  in 


TRANSCENDENTAL    LOGIC. 

our  human  social  experience  the  communication  of 
thought  from  man  to  man  is  necessarily  through 
media  of  sense-impression  and  reciprocal  sense-affec- 
tion. Thought  does  not  become  common  possesskm, 
but  through  some  symbolic  interpositions,  where  the 
thought  is  put  within  the  symbol,  and  the  receiver 
takes  it  from  the  symbol,  and  if  there  be  no  such 
medium  of  expression,  no  one  mind  can  read  the 
thought  and  sentiment  of  another.  It  is  God's  pre- 
rogative to  search  the  heart,  and  if  one  make  no  overt 
expression,  he  may  defy  all  men,  angels,  and  devils, 
to  know  his  inward  secrets.  In  the  flesh  the  only 
medium  of  communication  is  through  some  special 
sense-organ.  Hegel's  profoundest,  clearest  thought 
must  have  been  as  exclusively  for  himself  as  his 
dreams,  if  he  could  have  found  no  sense-symbols  of 
communication.  A  logic  cognizant  of  thinking-activ- 
ity only  may  have  actual  distinctions,  definitions,  and 
connections  of  thought  under  every  category,  but  the 
logical  thinking  could  find  no  real  participant  beyond 
the  thinker. 

And  so  also,  there  could  be  no  common  participa- 
tion in  one  space  and  time.  With  Hegel,  space  is 
the  abstract  externality.  All  interior  thought  is  as 
in  a  spaceless  point  and  a  timeless  instant,  but  when 
thought  goes  over  into  the  negative  counterpart  of 
externality,  it  then  enters  space,  and  may  be  de- 
termined in  time  as  an  infinity  of  possible  abstract 
instants  and  moments.  We  need  not  say  of  such 
abstract  space  and  time  that  they  are  no  likenesses  of 


68  ABSTRACT   LOGIC. 

reason-space  and  time.  Space  and  time  in  the  reason, 
are  concrete  unities  from  which  nothing  can  be  taken 
and  to  which  no  additions  can  be  made,  and  which 
are  illimitable  and  immutable  internally  or  externally, 
all  limit  and  change  belonging  not  to  them,  and  only 
to  that  which  may  be  in  them.  But  even  with 
Hegel's  space  and  time  as  abstract  emptiness,  mere 
thinking  could  have  no  common  participation  in  them 
with  human  sense-experience.  Every  man  must 
think  there  as  every  man  might  dream  there  in  his 
own  place  and  period,  and  his  thoughts  and  their 
places  and  periods  could  have  no  common  connec- 
tions with  another's  thoughts  in  their  places  and 
periods.  All  that  makes  our  own  places  and  periods 
in  a  common  experience  of  places  and  periods  with 
others  is  solely  this,  that  they  and  we  come  to  the 
same  stable  extensions  and  ordered  successions  for 
our  sense-affections,  and  if  we  and  they  did  not  re- 
ceive our  sense-appearances  from  the  same  substantial 
sources,  we  could  never  put  our  places  and  periods 
together  with  theirs  in  the  same  common  space  and 
common  time.  Aside  from  this,  every  man's  history 
would  be  a  separate  biography  of  his  inner  thought, 
and  could  never  be  included  in  the  current  history 
of  collective  humanity.  Restrict  all  being  to  thought, 
all  activity  to  thinking,  and  we  could  never  connect 
the  acts  and  thoughts  in  any  mode  of  common  space 
and  time  and  which  truly  we  do  in  our  human  ex- 
perience. The  Transcendental  Logic  can  never  rule 
in  the  conscious  experience  of  sense-phenomena. 


TRANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  69 

5.  Transcendental  logic  admits  no  other  force  than 
that  of  the  thinking -activity.  —  All  sense-impression 
and  affection  was  excluded  as  having  no  true  being 
in  the  Phenomenology,  and  only  the  thinking-activity 
was  retained  as  true  being,  and  so  the  modifications 
of  the  organs  of  sense  could  be  no  symbols  signifying 
forces  impressing  them.  Accordingly  when  the  logic 
attained  quality,  the  thinking  activity  produced  it  and 
gave  to  it  its  intrinsic  determinations  of  attraction 
and  repulsion  ;  and  then,  when  quantity,  measured  to 
its  specific  degree,  became  a  determined  somewhat, 
and  carried  beyond  the  limiting  degree  went  onward 
to  become  a  different  somewhat,  these  distinguishing 
limits  for  different  things  were  all  products  of  the 
thinking  movement ;  and  so  again,  when  quality  and 
quantity  coalesced  in  Essence,  the  reflecting  and 
reverting  counter-acts  of  the  "  Begriff "  were  the 
only  forces  throughout  as  giving  efficiency  to  cause, 
phenomena  to  substance,  and  reciprocal  efficiency  in 
action  and  reaction. 

And  further,  the  supersensual  "realm  of  law," 
back  of  the  thinking  and  necessitating  the  move- 
ment, and  which  in  the  reason  might  have  been  made 
original  for  all  distinguishable  forces,  was  determined 
as  itself  a  transcendental  thought-process,  disceding 
into  particular  laws  and  combining  again  into  a  uni- 
versal "  infinitude  of  law,"  so  that  not  only  all  force 
but  all  ruling  of  forces  is  determined  after  one  and 
the  same  method  of  thinking-action.  All  efficiency, 
making  things  and  their  manifestations  in  the  under- 


70  ABSTRACT   LOGIC. 

standing,  and  giving  to  nature  its  being  and  connec- 
tions, is  solely  the  force  of  thinking-activity. 

But  in  our  world  of  sense-experience  we  well  know, 
whatever  we  may  say  of  the  power  of  ideas,  that  their 
conversion  into  fact  must  have  other  forces  in  oper- 
ation and  execution  than  any  thinking  in  determined 
and  combined  plan  ;  there  must  beyond  thought  be 
the  distinctive  energy  which  moves  muscles,  and 
works  changes  in  hard  materials,  and  puts  the 
thought-out  plan  in  and  upon  substantial  and  abiding 
things.  Our  thinking-activity  is  force  sufficient  for 
constructing  pure  figures,  and  arranging  mental  dia- 
grams, and  abstracting  and  generalizing  thought-con- 
ceptions, but  when  we  have  carefully  put  our  thought 
in  clear  systematic  construction  within  our  own  con- 
scious intuition,  the  force  of  the  thinking  activity  has 
done  all  it  may,  and  it  must  stand  in  our  subjective 
world  alone,  if  a  further  and  more  effective  energy  of 
will  does  not  supervene,  and  express  the  thought  in 
overt  fact  and  work  it  on  to  abiding  substance,  and 
thereby  put  the  subjective  idea  into  objective  reality. 
We  never  make  any  thought  obtrusive  by  the  mere 
force  of  thought,  and  the  clearest  logical  forms  must 
have  their  dynamical  utterances,  or  they  remain  utter- 
ly vain  and  empty  for  all  human  experience.  Even 
logical  rule  must  be  made  effective  by  a  higher  force 
than  is  in  the  thinking-process. 

Before  taking  up  any  further  form  of  logic,  it  will 
be  important  to  note,  in  connection,  some  of  the  com- 
parative defects  of  the  syllogistic  and  the  transcen- 
dental systems. 


TRANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  71 

1.  TJie  old  logic  cannot  move,  and  the  Hegelian  logic 
cannot  rest.  —  The  old  logic  is  determined  by  the  con- 
ceptions, and  these  are  abstracted  and  generalized 
from  experience,  and  only  the  permanent  character- 
istics of  sense-objects  are  taken  and  retained.  The 
peculiarities  of  individuals  are  passed  by,  and  so  the 
attributes  of  the  particulars,  species,  and  genera  are 
respectively  changeless.  These  impress  their  forms 
upon  mind,  and  so  the  logical  judgments  and  syllo- 
gistic conclusions  are  fixed  by  them  and  all  thinking 
is  determined  from  them,  and  change  and  movement 
become  unaccountable,  whether  in  thought  or  thing. 
Matter  is  made  wholly  inert,  and  its  motion  and 
change  must  come  from  somewhat  outside  of  it ;  and 
mind  also  can  know  only  as  affected  by  matter,  and 
thus  mind  cannot  move  or  change  except  as  first  mat- 
ter must  move  or  change.  A  first  mover  as  an 
originator  of  activity  is  inconceivable,  and  an  attempt 
to  put  in  descriptive  terms  such  a  thought  could  only 
expose  its  absurdity  and  self-contradiction. 

The  Hegelian  logic,  on  the  other  hand,  is  regulated 
by  the  thinking-activity,  abstracted  from  experience 
by  carefully  taking  that  only  which,  at  the  end  of  a 
process,  is  found  to  have  self-movement  and  is  pro- 
ductive of  all  recognized  objects,  and  so  everything 
moves  whether  subject  or  object.  Mind  cannot  rest 
at  any  attained  position,  and  all  thoughts  in  external 
relations  revert  back  to  the  internal  thinking  for  their 
validity,  and  nothing  rests ;  there  is  no  static  point 
nor  instant  from  which  determined  motion  or  change 


72  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

may  begin,  nor  in  which  they  may  terminate,  and  rest 
or  stability  is  here  as  inexplicable  as  in  the  old  logic 
were  motion  and  change,  and  an  attempt  to  put  in 
logical  terms  fixed  and  steadfast  being  will  end  in 
nothing  but  absurdity  and  confusion. 

2.  By  the  logic  of  neither  alone  can  we  determine  the 
tuhole  of  our  experience.  — Without  the  consciousness  of 
motion  we  can  determine  nothing  of  any  experience  at 
rest,  and  with  no  consciousness  of  rest  we  can  deter- 
mine nothing  of  any  experience  moving.    Our  experi- 
ence has  in  it  both  objects  at  rest  and  objects  in  mo- 
tion and  change,  but  one  logic  knows  nothing  of  mo- 
tion, the  other  nothing  of  rest.    Neither  can  go  back  to 
any  state  when  it  has  been  otherwise  with  itself,  and 
with  its  experience,  and  with  our  human  experience, 
than  at  present,  for  the  old  logic  never  knew  a  rest- 
ing from  precedent  motion,  and  the  later  logic  never 
knew  a  beginning  of  motion  from   precedent    rest. 
One  stands  and  nature  works  its  changes  for  it,  and 
the  other  moves  and  works  nature's  changes  into  it, 
and  so   to   both,   some  part  of  nature's   experience 
must  be   an   enigma.     One  cannot  say  how   nature 
came  to  express  a  stable  experience,  nor  the  other 
how  it  came  to  exhibit  a  fleeting  experience. 

3.  Both  together  might  exhaust  all  determinations  in 
experience,  but  neither  nor  both  ca:i  rise  above  experi- 
ence.—  One  is  deficient  in  determining  any  knowledge 
for  a  moving  experience,  and  the  other  for  a  resting 
experience,  and  here  one  may  supplement  the  other, 
and  all  experience  be  subjected  thereby  to  full  deter- 


TBANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  73 

initiations.  The  two  together  might  subject  to  knowl- 
edge all  empirical  facts,  but  neither  one  nor  both 
together  can  avail  anything  in  carrying  our  knowl- 
edge above  experience.  The  so-called  transcendental 
logic  is  still  within  the  universal,  and  this  logical  uni- 
versal is  but  an  empirical  universal,  and  can  say  only, 
Experience  is  as  I  find  it,  since  I  am  constituted  in- 
competent to  think  it  to  be  otherwise.  Neither  can 
reach  an  ultimate  that  is  absolute,  and  find  an  author 
and  finisher  of  experience  itself.  Law  is  as  invari- 
able experience  has  been  for  both,  and  neither  logic 
can  tolerate  a  violation  of  its  law  and  admit  a  miracle. 
Indeed,  what  is  law  to  one  is  miracle  to  the  other, 
and  to  neither  is  there  any  possibility  of  adjusting  mi- 
raculous interpositions. 

4.  Tlie  transcendental  logic  is  wholly  dependent  upon 
the  use  it  must  make  of  the  old  logic.  —  Where  the 
thinking-activity  has  been  found  by  the  wondrous 
acuteness  and  comprehensiveness  of  the  Phenome- 
nology in  dispelling  all  the  illusions  of  sense-perception 
and  reflection,  and  so  the  "  Begriff "  is  present  for 
the  logical  movement,  yet  cannot  the  work  of  deter- 
mining, limiting,  and  stating  of  thought  at  all  go  on, 
except  by  availing  itself  of  the  whole  labor  of  the  old 
logic  in  its  analyses,  abstractions,  and  generalizations. 
The  transcendental  process  has  been  usually  termed 
a  development,  an  evolution,  as  if  the  logic  had 
been  brought  out  from  it ;  and  sometimes  the  thought 
is  spoken  of  as  the  product,  and  even  the  creation,  of 
the  thinking-activity.  But  such  is  assumption  or  pre- 


74  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

tension  merely.  The  process  starts  in  determining  be- 
tween pure  abstract  being  and  its  counterpart  naught ; 
and  yet  this  pure  abstraction  is  the  conclusion  and 
comprehension  of  the  whole  generalization  of  the  old 
logic.  The  pure  being  has  had  all  content  of  experi- 
ence abstracted,  and  every  attribute  experience  gave 
has  been  put  over,  in  the  extent  of  the  conception,  to 
the  particulars,  species,  and  genera  as  wide  as  being 
reaches.  The  universal  of  experience,  just  as  the  old 
logic  has  gained  it,  has  been  put  over  as  a  gratuity 
into  the  hand  of  the  transcendental  logic-making  for 
its  own  use  and  behoof,  and  but  for  this  gratuity  it 
it  could  neither  have  begun  nor  completed  its  work. 
All  objective  being  which  it  exhibits,  from  primitive 
quality  to  concluding  self-identity,  comes  from  the 
extent  of  this  generalized  conception  of  pure  being, 
and  the  "  development "  is  really  of  the  old  logical 
being,  and  not  any  new  production,  or  creation,  or 
self-evolution,  of  the  thinking-activity.  Old  laborers 
had  patiently  gathered  piecemeal  the  scattered  facts 
of  all  ages,  and  wrapped  up  species  and  genera  in  this 
universal  conception,  and  the  thinking  process  again 
unfolds  them.  The  trilogic  method  is  the  invention  of 
the  transcendentalist,  and  to  his  immortal  credit  and 
honor,  but  the  abstract  being  the  method  develops 
had  been  taken  in  its  highest  generalization  from  the 
day  of  Aristotle,  and  but  for  this  the  exactness  and 
completeness  of  the  method  could  never  have  ex- 
pressed itself  in  systematic  form.  This  "abstract 
being  "  is,  as  before  shown,  for  Hegel  what  the  "  nou- 


TRANSCENDENTAL  LOGIC.  75 

menon  "  was  for  Kant,  and  indeed  the  only  being  at- 
tained at  last  is  this  same  abstract  being  which  the  old 
logic  had  given,  and  it  enters  the  thought-activity  as 
the  only  essence  with  which  in  its  maturity  the  think- 
ing can  identify  itself, 

5.  We  note  what  certitude  either  of  these  logical 
modes  can  attain.  —  According  to  the  old  logic,  when 
the  judgment  has  executed  its  functions  in  Quality, 
Quantity,  and  Relation  by  determining  their  con- 
tent, there  comes  a  fourth  function  of  judgment,  hav- 
ing no  reference  to  content,  and  only  to  validity  of 
copulative  connection,  known  as  Mode.  This  has 
three  varieties,  viz.,  the  Problematical,  which  may 
have  validity ;  the  Assertorical,  taken  as  valid ;  and 
the  Apodictical,  which  has  been  logically  proved,  and 
so  is  necessarily  and  universally  valid  ;  yet  this  neces- 
sary and  universal  validity  rests  on  logical  ground 
attained  by  the  abstractions  and  generalizations  of 
experience,  and  can  therefore  have  validity  of  no  safer 
or  broader  ground  than  human  experience.  A  higher 
certitude  is  needed  than  that  attained  in  deductions 
and  conclusions  from  any  data  given  by  experience, 
and  which  the  old  logic  can  by  no  means  furnish. 
Beyond  logical  ground  as  principle  of  deductive  con- 
clusion, we  must  have,  for  satisfactory  knowledge, 
rational  cause  as  principle  for  being ;  a  logic  not  for 
proving,  but  for  knowing  true  being,  as  the  only  con- 
dition for  proving  anything. 

And  so  when  Hegel  has  carried  the  formal  think- 
ing of  abstract  being  to  essence,  and  then  united 


76  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

being  and  essence  in  the  "  Begriff"  as  thinking-activ- 
ity, and  made  thereby  logical  thinking  the  ground  for 
being,  he  still  shows  his  felt-need  of  a  deeper  ground, 
for  he  carries  out  this  logic  at  least  to  a  supposed 
self-consciousness  in  a  universal  of  all  thinking  par- 
ticulars ;  and  this  he  takes  to  be  absolute  reason  in 
a  complete  identity  of  thinking  and  being.  We  have 
already  shown  the  inadequacy  of  Hegel's  logical  uni- 
versal humanity  to  stand  for  absolute  reason ;  but 
with  no  question  of  the  completeness  of  this  attained 
reason  from  universal  humanity,  we  have  in  it  the 
clearly  admitted  necessity  the  logic  supposes,  for  a 
deeper  ground  on  which  to  place  the  validity  of  being 
than  that  of  logical  thinking.  The  thinking  must  itself 
go  back  for  its  anti-type  and  control,  to  the  deeper 
"  quiet  realm  of  law  "  which  underlies  it.  When 
then  in  any  way,  formal  logical  necessity  and  univer- 
sality have  been  attained,  we  must  still  have  a  deeper 
knowledge  in  the  insight  of  reason,  or  our  logic  of 
experience,  and  experience  itself,  are  destitute  of  any 
satisfactory  certitude. 

There  is  yet  one  more  method  of  prominent  logical 
importance  to  be  noticed,  before  we  come  to  that 
which  is  the  source  and  test  of  all  that  is  valid  cer- 
tainty in  any  form  of  logic.  All  have  some  parts  in 
common  with  the  true,  and  in  so  much  each  has  its 
portion  of  truth  that  has  been  the  stand-point  from 
which  the  whole  has  been  produced,  and  this  one  now 
to  be  considered  will  bring  us  fairly  to  that  which  has 
its  evidence  in  its  own  light. 


LOGIC   OF   FOKCE.  77 


IV. 

THE   LOGIC    OF   FORCE. 

THIS  method  of  Logic  is  very  much  the  converse  of 
the  transcendental,  using  substantial  forces  for  the 
connection  of  things  as  the  latter  uses  reflective  acts 
for  the  connection  of  thoughts.  Each  method  fails  to 
recognize  the  distinctive  human  faculty  with  which  all 
true  logic  must  be  executed,  and  uses  the  understanding 
only  in  determining  the  truth  in  nature  and  in  mind, 
and  each  also  puts  its  own  respective  connection  to 
hold  together  the  phenomena  of  both  matter  and 
mind ;  the  physicist  using  force  as  the  essence  alike 
of  material  and  mental  facts,  while  the  transcenden- 
talist  uses  his  thinking-process  as  the  one  agency 
identical  in  both  the  internality  of  spirit  and  the  ex- 
ternality of  nature.  Both  also  have  made  large  ad- 
vances, each  in  its  own  province,  in  the  attainment 
and  classification  of  facts  and  bringing  them  nearer 
to  the  determinations  of  reason,  but  with  both,  the 
discrimination  has  been  quite  too  vague  for  any  ad- 
equate recognition  of  the  sharp  outline  that  sepa- 
rates the  retrospection  of  the  reflective  faculty  from 
the  insight  of  the  comprehensive  faculty.  Most  gladly 
and  gratefully  we  acknowledge  the  eminent  service 


78  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

rendered  to  science  and  philosophy  by  each,  and  yet 
with  the  like  fidelity  and  impartiality  must  the  defi- 
ciencies of  the  Logic  of  Force  be  exposed  as  has  al- 
ready been  done  in  the  case  of  the  Transcendental 
Logic.  Prominent  names  appear  as  collaborators  in 
clearing  up  and  applying  their  notions  of  force  to 
physical  science,  but  by  far  the  clearest  and  most  sys- 
tematic author  in  the  presentation  of  the  Logic  of 
Force  is  Herbert  Spencer. 

An  outline  of  what  he  has  given  will  answer  our 
present  design  without  specific  details,  and  though  the 
system  of  logical  physics  is  far  from  having  attained 
the  exactness  and  completeness  which  Hegel  has 
given  to  his  logical  metaphysics,  still  enough  has  been 
done  to  disclose  clearly  where  a  further  prosecution 
must  fetch-up,  and  also  that  the  dawning  of  reason, 
into  which  the  movement  is  necessarily  driven,  must 
soon  shine  too  clearly  to  permit  a  persistence,  in  an 
unchanged  direction  very  much  longer,  to  be  satis- 
factory either  to  author  or  reader. 

It  is  at  first  affirmed  that  religion  and  science  have, 
unhappily,  long  been  in  conflict,  the  one  in  referring 
all  phenomena  directly  to  God,  and  the  other  to  an 
intrinsic  power  in  nature  itself.  But  Evolution,  as  a 
more  general  truth,  will  include  both,  and  harmonize 
them  in  the  necessary  admission  that  the  ultimate 
for  each  is  an  utterly  unknowable.  Both  the  God  of 
one  and  the  Nature  of  the  other  stand  back  beyond 
all  knowledge  in  unfathomed  mystery. 

Human  knowledge  is  possible  only  through  distinc- 


LOGIC   OF   FORCE.  79 

tion,  and  therefore  only  of  the  relative,  and  however 
large  the  circle  may  be  made  within  which  growing 
experiment  and  research  shall  find  and  determine  the 
phenomenal  relations,  it  must  only  make  the  outlying 
field  of  the  unexplored  to  border-in  upon  a  larger  cir- 
cumference. Both  parties  admit  the  beyond  alike  to 
be  real,  but  both  also  must  submit  to  the  necessity  of 
owning  that,  beyond  the  relative  and  conditioned, 
this  acknowledged  reality  is  yet  an  utter  terra  incog- 
nita. There  is  a  positive  known,  and  a  positive  un- 
known. Study  the  relative  known,  and  the  result  is 
clearer  order  and  system ;  study  the  absolute  unknown, 
and  we  run  into  deeper  confusion  and  uncertainty. 

The  first  work  is  to  seize  upon  law,  which  is  uni- 
formity of  relation.  A  clear  search  will  find  this 
everywhere  amid  surrounding  facts,  and  for  particu- 
lar cognate  facts  particular  laws  will  widen  to  more 
general  classes,  till  you  may  come  to  one  law  tran- 
scendently  general.  This  most  general  law  is  Evolu- 
tion, and  as  last  and  highest  will  be  latest  found  and 
least  thoroughly  apprehended. 

Evolution  differs  from  the  common  conception  of 
progress  mainly  in  that  we  deem  what  bears  upon  the 
increase  of  human  happiness  alone  to  be  progress,  but 
evolution  is  more  general,  and  includes  progress  from 
the  simpler  to  the  more  complex  —  from  homogeneity 
to  heterogeneity  —  as  illustrated  in  the  nebular  theory 
of  the  heavens,  geology,  society,  &c.  Yet  not  all  such 
processes  are  those  of  evolution,  for  disease  and  death, 
as  dissolution,  are  the  reverse  of  evolution.  Evolu- 


80  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

tion  also  becomes  the  more  definite  the  more  it  be- 
comes complex,  while  dissolution  is  the  more  indefi- 
nite as  it  augments  in  heterogeneity.  Subsidiary  to 
this  growing  defmiteness,  evolution  also  grows  more 
coherent  as  it  is  the  more  complex.  The  definiteness 
comes  through  integration,  while  indefiniteness  is  from 
differentiation.  Everywhere  there  has  been,  and  is 
now,  going  on  an  evolution  from  indeterminate  uni- 
formity to  determinate  multiplicity.  The  definition 
of  this  law  in  terms  is  —  "a  change  from  an  in- 
definite, incoherent  homogeneity,  to  a  definite,  coherent 
heterogeneity,  through  continuous  differentiations  and 
integrations" 

The  second  step  is  to  find  an  all-pervading  principle 
which  underlies  this  all-pervading  process.  From 
some  analogies  the  attempt  is  encouraged  and  steadily 
prosecuted,  to  interpret  the  law  of  evolution  as  the 
necessary  consequence  of  a  deeper  law,  beyond  which 
last,  however,  it  may  be  found  impossible  to  proceed. 

There  are  different  species  of  evolution,  such  as  as- 
tronomic, geologic,  organic,  ethnologic,  social,  eco- 
nomic, artistic,  &c.,  and  whatever  may  be  the  agency 
and  conditions  of  a  common  causation,  the  best  guide 
to  the  underlying  principle  must  be  to  take  hold  on 
that  which  is  in  all ;  and  this  alone  is  common  to 
them  that  they  are  all  "  modes  of  change,"  and  this  of 
"  internal,"  instead  of  "  external  relations,"  and  must 
therefore  consist  of  "  change  in  the  arrangement  of 
parts  ;  "  and  in  the  order  of  incoherent,  indefinite  ho- 
mogeneity to  coherent,  definite  heterogeneity.  And 


LOGIC   OF   FORCE. 

in  this  we  come  "  face  to  face  with  the  ultimate  ele- 
ments of  phenomena  in  general,"  viz.,  matter,  motion, 
and  force. 

Absolute  truth  is  ever  beyond  us,  and  thus  absolute 
knowledge  of  matter,  motion,  and  force  is  impossible, 
44  but  what  is  the  exact  meaning  of  the  assertion  that 
they  are  relatively  true  "  ?  The  terms  phenomenon 
and  appearance  delude  us  as  if  they  were  "  phan- 
tasms," but  if  in  place  of  them  we  use  the  term  effect, 
which  is  applicable  to  all  impressions  on  conscious- 
ness through  sense,  and  which  has  "  real  cause"  as 
correlative,  "  we  shall  be  in  little  danger  of  falling 
into  the  insanities  of  idealism."  Any  further  danger, 
if  there  be  any,  will  be  avoided  by  putting  for  "real" 
the  meaning  of  "  persistence  in  consciousness." 

So  guarded,  "  the  result  must  be  the  same  to  us, 
whether  that  which  we  perceive  be  the  uncondi- 
tioned itself,  or  an  effect  invariably  wrought  in  us  by 
the  unconditioned."  Hence  we  may  conclude  —  we- 
have  indefinite  consciousness  of  absolute  realities  ;  and' 
definite  consciousness  of  relative  realities  ;  and  that 
the  relative  can  be  conceived  only  in  connection 
with  an  absolute,  and  so  such  persistent  connection 
of  the  relative  and  absolute  is  real.  "  The  persistent 
impressions  being  the  persistent  results  of  a  persistent 
cause,  are  for  practical  purposes  the  same  to  us  as  the 
cause  itself,  and  may  be  habitually  dealt  with  as  its 
equivalent." 

There  are  two  primary  forms  of  relation,  without 
which  we  cannot  think,  viz.,  sequence  which  appears 
6 


82  ABSTEACT   LOGIC. 

in  all  changes,  and  coexistence  where  the  order  of  the 
changes  is  reversible  at  pleasure,  and  these  experi- 
ence distinguishes,  and  by  abstracting  the  sequences 
attains  pure  Time,  and  in  abstracting  the  coexistences 
attains  pure  Space.  The  experience  for  this  is  in  the 
sense  of  touch  whereby  muscular  resistance  in  corre- 
lation occurs,  and  the  abstraction  made  is  of  the  cor- 
relative resistance,  and  so  of  force,  and  thus  the  pure 
abstractions  of  time  and  space  are  the  relatives  of 
force.  We  cannot  say  of  such  relatives  that  they 
represent  some  forms  of  an  absolute  time  or  of 
space,  and  only  this,  that  the  relative  conception  is 
produced  by  some  mode  of  the  absolute,  and  hence 
relatively  real  in  consciousness  and  implying  an  un- 
changing absolute. 

Matter,  distinct  from  abstract  space,  is  the  concep- 
tion of  coexistent  positions  which  offer  resistance, 
and  the  conception  of  body  is  that  of  matter  bounded 
by  resisting  surfaces,  and  so  both  matter  and  body  are 
relations  of  force,  implying  some  mode  of  an  unknown 
^absolute  cause. 

Motion  involves  space,  time,  and  matter,  all  rela- 
tives of  force ;  and  so  motion  is  relative,  implying 
some  mode  of  an  existing  absolute. 

Force  is  thus  the  "  ultimate  of  ultimates  ;  "  all  is 
from  it,  and  it  is  from  nothing  else,  and  so  is  abso- 
lute as  beyond  all.  Consciousness  itself  is  possible 
only  through  change,  and  change  is  the  manifestation 
of  force,  hence  force  is  to  us  necessarily  the  last 
analysis  and  highest  generalization. 


LOGIC   OF  FORCE.  83 

After  attaining  this  ultimate  analysis  and  universal 
conception  of  Absolute  Force,  from  which  all  synthe- 
sis must  begin  to  build,  there  follow  further  consider- 
ations of  axiomatic  requisites  for  evolution  —  as  the 
indestructibility  of  matter,  the  continuity  of  motion, 
the  persistence  of  force,  the  correlation  and  equiva- 
lence of  forces  ;  the  direction  of  -motion  in  the  line 
of  least  resistance,  and  the  rhythm  or  oscillation  of 
motion.  And  then  again,  conditions  essential  to  evo- 
lution, —  as  that  matter  must  be  moderately  mova- 
ble ;  chemically  decomposable  assisted  by  agitation  ; 
not  changes  of  matter  only,  but  also  change  of  mo  - 
tion,  wherein  the  motion  of  units  passing  into  the  ag- 
gregate makes  evolution,  while  motion  of  the  aggre- 
gate changed  to  motion  of  the  units  is  dissolution.  Af- 
ter which,  in  conclusion,  is  the  consideration  of  the 
changes  themselves,  —  as  from  the  instability  of  the 
homogeneous ;  the  multiplication  of  effects  ;  how  or- 
derly integration  accompanies  disintegration;  &c.;  but 
for  all  present  purposes  with  the  Logic,  we  have  what 
is  needed  in  the  above  last  analysis  and  highest  gener- 
alization of  force.  This  is  asserted  to  be  "  the  founda- 
tion of  any  possible  system  of  positive  knowledge. 
Deeper  than  demonstration,  deep  as  the  very  nature  of 
mind,"  since  without  this  as  furnishing  constant  con- 
tent to  consciousness,  a  persistent  consciousness  is 
impossible. 

There  is  abundant  opportunity  for  making  manifest 
certain  deficiencies  and  inconsistencies  in  matters  which 
follow  after  this  attained  last  analysis,  especially  such 


84  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

as  the  following  —  That  evolution  is  admitted  to  be 
partial  only,  inasmuch  as  dissolution  is  ever  concur- 
rent with  it,  and  is  yet  never  comprehended  by  it ; 
thus  leaving  a  wide  region  of  phenomena  with  no 
philosophical  explanation.  That  the  operating  forces 
noticed  as  bearing  upon  evolution  are  such  only  as 
are  exceedingly  general,  while  the  minuter  and  more 
specific  forces  must  be  the  ones  most  directly  effec- 
tive in  shaping  nicer  events,  and  especially  personal 
purposes  and  tender  sympathies  ;  just  as  the  sculp- 
tor's artistic  skill  will  be  more  adequately  shown  in 
the  finer  touches  of  the  file  than  in  the  rude  strokes 
first  chipping  out  the  marble.  And  finally,  while  de- 
nying that  absolute  force  can  be  made  intelligible, 
the  author  evinces  his  own  repugnance  to  the  denial 
by  an  d  priori  demonstration  that  such  knowledge  is 
essential  for  a  consciousness  of  anything.  We  pass 
all  these,  since  the  essential  point  of  the  logical  ab- 
surdity is  the  Universal  Force.  This  is  to  the  Logic 
of  Spencer  what  the  thinking-activity  was  to  the 
Logic  of  Hegel  —  thought  and  knowledge  are  with 
each  respectively  conditioned  by  their  last  analysis 
and  universal  conception,  only  with  one  the  ultimate 
condition  is  in  Absolute  Mind,  and  with  the  other  it 
is  Absolute  Matter. 

It  has  above  been  cheerfully  acknowledged  that 
science,  especially  mental,  has  been  largely  indebted 
to  Hegel,  and  we  have  just  as  grateful  acknowledg- 
ment to  make  that  science,  especially  physical,  has 
been  greatly  indebted  to  Spencer  and  his  co-laborers  ; 


LOGIC   OF  FORCE.  85 

but  as  we  have  found  in  the  former  case,  that  it  was 
from  the  recognition  of  the  thinking-activity  itself, 
and  not  from  the  logic  produced,  the  benefit  has  been 
derived  ;  just  so  is  it  here  in  the  latter  case  ;  the  ser- 
vice accredited  is  from  the  force  so  prominently  and 
imperishably  introduced,  and  not  at  all  from  the  logic 
which  is  made  to  accompany  it.  If  Hegel's  "Begriff  " 
depended  for  general  recognition  on  the  logic  pro- 
duced, the  world  could  not  be  made  to  take  and  keep 
it ;  and  if  Spencer's  Absolute  Force  depended  for 
general  adoption  on  the  attending  logic,  it  could  not 
survive  for  a  single  generation.  Both  the  thought- 
process  arid  the  working-force  are  perishingly  needed, 
not  because  either  of  their  logical  systems  is  adequate, 
nor  that  one  can  so  supplement  the  other  that  out  of 
both  a  true  logic  can  come,  but  because  the  respec- 
tive activities  recognized  are  each  necessary  connec- 
tives for  a  universal  philosophy.  The  tri-logic  method 
of  reflective  thought  and  the  dynamic  method  of  phys- 
ical research  have  helped  the  world  on  immensely 
in  scientific  attainment,  but  these  new  possessions 
cannot  be  used  to  any  philosophical  ends,  except  by 
an  introduction  of  a  higher  and  better  logic  than 
either  has  given.  As  this  has  been  shown  already  in 
the  case  of  the  transcendental,  so  we  now  proceed  to 
establish  the  same  in  the  case  of  the  dynamical  Logic. 
The  Doctrine  of  physical  Force  as  the  substance  of 
matter  is  true,  but  the  ground  on  which  it  has  been 
placed  is  illogical.  When  we  have  so  determined  it, 
the  door  is  opened  for  the  complete  introduction  and 
explanation  of  the  better  Logic. 


86  ABSTEACT    LOGIC. 

The  refutation  of  this  Logic  is  ample  by  clearly 
disclosing,  that  it  essays  the  self-absurdity  of  thinking 
relatively  and  knowing  absolutely  by  one  and  the  same 
intellectual  faculty .  —  To  think  relatively  is  in  the  pri- 
mary acceptation  to  think  distinctively.  The  think- 
ing act  thrusts  itself  between  objects,  and  so  discrimi- 
nates one  from  another.  Such  distinguishing  activity 
exposes  the  relative  determinations  of  the  objects  to 
each  other  in  consciousness,  and  discloses  their  con- 
nected standing  in  an  ordered  experience.  It  is 
thinking  in  its  very  incipiency,  and  arranging  sense- 
appearances  relatively  to  each  other  in  conscious  con- 
sistency. All  objects  primitively  appear  through  sen- 
sation, and  however  we  may  subsequently  modify 
them  by  analysis,  abstraction,  or  composition,  they 
permanently  retain  their  relations  in  and  to  conscious 
experience,  and  thus  thinking  relatively  comes  in  the 
largest  sense  to  be  thinking  within  consciousness. 
Exclusively  so  thinking,  all  will  be  restricted  within 
experience.  All  conceptions  will  take  content  from 
experience  ;  all  judgments  will  get  their  predicates 
from  experience  ;  all  induction  and  classification  will 
be  after  the  order  of  experience  ;  and  every  major 
premise  in  a  syllogism  will  be  filled  from  empirical  ob- 
servation ;  and  all  deductions  and  conclusions  will  be 
kept  within  the  field  of  conscious  experience.  Con- 
sciousness is  made  the  primary  source  and  ultimate 
test  of  all  truth,  and  universal  science  consists  in 
finding  the  distinctions  and  marking  the  relations 
which  long  and  careful  observation  and  experience 
have  put  within  consciousness. 


LOGIC   OF   FOBCE.  87 

Herein,  then,  is  the  one  exclusive  basis  for  a  Logic 
of  Consciousness.  If  the  thinking  does  not  in  some 
way  become  delusive  by  interposing  equivocal  ex- 
pressions or  ambiguous  meaning,  it  will  be  solely  re- 
flective and  discursive,  viz.,  turning  itself  back  on 
attained  experiences,  forming  conceptions  more  or 
less  abstractly  general,  predicating  attributes  of  sub- 
jects, and  deducing  conclusions,  strictly  as  taught  by 
the  most  careful  and  extended  consciousness.  All 
beyond  experience  is  held  to  be  inconceivable,  un- 
thinkable, unknowable.  So  Herbert  Spencer  strenu- 
ously and  peremptorily  insists  on  keeping  within  the 
relative,  since  the  human  intellect  is  faculty  for  work- 
ing only  with  relative  distinctions  in  consciousness. 

And  yet,  doubtless  as  deceptively  to  himself  as  it 
is  delusive  to  others,  he  has  been  making  careful 
though  covert  preparation  for  sliding  over  upon  very 
different  ground  which  lies  wholly  within  another 
logical  jurisdiction.  He  has  repudiated  the  terms 
phenomenon  and  appearance  as  tending  to  make  us 
"  feel  ourselves  floating  in  a  world  of  phantasms,"  and 
has  substituted  for  them  the  word  effect  as  "  equally 
applicable  to  all  impressions  produced  on  conscious- 
ness," and  which,  he  says,  "  carries  with  it  in  thought 
the  necessary  correlative  cause"  and  by  so  doing  he 
deems  "  we  should  be  in  little  danger  of  falling  into 
the  insanities  of  idealism."  All  this  he  does  as  if  he 
supposed  a  logical  ratio  percipiendi  could  at  pleasure 
become  a  dialectical  ratio  essendi,  and  that  veritable 
efficiencies  and  forces  could  become  matters  of  con- 


88  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

sciousness  by  misplacing  rational  cause  and  effect 
where  only  empirical  ground  and  consequent  can  have 
any  logical  right.  To  all  reflective  thought  on  con- 
scious experience,  in  the  absence  of  rational  insight, 
"  correlative  cause,"  except  as  merely  antecedent  phe- 
nomenon, is  exactly  one  of  Spencer's  idealistic  "  in- 
sanities," and  can  be  nothing  other  than  a  transcen- 
dental in  distinction  from  an  empirical  conception. 
44  Effect "  and  its  "  correlative  cause  "  are  nothing  more 
than  "  phenomena"  in  invariable  succession  inexperi- 
ence, except  as  the  insight  of  reason,  beyond  reflective 
consciousness,  sees  in  the  successions  an  efficient  deter- 
mining their  order  of  antecedent  and  consequent. 

And  then  still  further  in  deepening  the  illusion, 
consciousness  is  to  be  made  persistent  by  giving  to  it 
persistent  content  from  an  absolute  real  where  no 
relative  real  can  furnish  the  supply.  Consciousness 
cannot  be  kept  persistent  by  relative  realities  flitting 
in  and  out,  and  so  an  unknowable  absolute  is  assumed 
to  keep  up  the  continual  successions.  What  if  em- 
pirical consciousness  cannot  be  kept  constant  by 
merely  evanescent  impressions  in  sense-experience? 
That  might  well  be  sufficient  reason  for  not  making 
consciousness  a  basis  for  universal  logic  ;  certainly  not 
a  justification,  having  made  such  basis,  for  the  logi- 
cian to  go  beyond  his  ultimate  and  smuggle  in  help 
from  an  absolute  utterly  incognizable  by  conscious- 
ness. And  yet  the  resort  is  to  just  this  method.  We 
can  think  only  relatively  ;  relative  realities  cannot 
keep  consciousness  persistent;  it  is  then  assumed  that 


LOGIC   OF   FORCE.  89 

we  have  a  "persistent  impression  "  giving  to  us  a 
"  vague  "  or  an  "  indefinite  consciousness  "  of  an  ab- 
solute, the  "  persistent  impression  "  being  an  "  effect " 
from  the  absolute  and  so  a  relative  of  the  absolute. 
We  thus  have  persistent  consciousness  because  we 
have  "  persistent  impression  "as  an  effect  from  the 
absolute,  and  we  think  relatively  because  the  impres- 
sion is  a  relative  effect  of  the  absolute.  "  Thought 
being  possible  only  under  relation,  the  relative  reality 
can  be  conceived  as  such  only  in  connection  with 
an  absolute  reality  ;  "  and  then  "  the  connection  be- 
tween the  two,  being  absolutely  persistent  in  our 
consciousness,  is  real  in  the  same  sense  as  the  terms 
it  unites  are  real."  But  the  old  logic  adopted,  and  so 
strenuously  maintained,  must  keep  consciousness  per- 
sistent, if  at  all,  by  only  relative  realities,  for  it  can 
know  no  other  ;  and  its  relative  thinking  is  solely  in 
reference  to  the  relations  of  conscious  experience,  and 
not  at  all  to  any  relations  with  an  absolute  reality. 
The  new  side  presented  could  not  have  been  con- 
ceived if  the  logic  had  kept  its  proper  function  in  its 
legitimate  province. 

The  absurdity  involved  comes  from  the  surrepti- 
tious introduction  of  cognitions  which  can  be  attained 
only  by  their  distinctive  function  of  intelligence,  as  if 
they  were  apprehended  by  a  lower  and  very  different 
intellectual  faculty.  Hence  we  have  an  absolute 
reality  beyond  conscious  experience,  on  which  con- 
sciousness itself  is  dependent,  and  this  too  a  higher 
generalization  from  a  deeper  analysis  than  that  which 


90  ABSTKACT  LOGIC. 

attains  matter,  motion,  space  and  time,  or  even  per- 
sistent consciousness  which  is  conditioned  by  it ;  and 
yet  the  logic  on  which  all  cognition  rests  is,  that  con- 
sciousness is  ultimate,  and  experience  fundamental, 
and  thought  itself  is  only  of  the  relative  in  conscious- 
ness. Where  experience  stops  short,  there  all  knowl- 
edge ceases.  If  this  logic  is  to  rule,  we  surely  can  say 
nothing  about  relative  realities  as  being  "  effects  "  from 
absolute  reality;  and  the  absolute  as  "persistent," 
since  otherwise  consciousness  would  cease  ;  and  that 
the  ultimate  relative  in  consciousness  must  be  a  rela- 
tive effect  of  an  absolute  since  it  can  have  no  other 
relative,  and  thought  must  be  of  the  relative.  All 
these  "  effects "  and  a  priori  prerequisites  can  be 
known  only  by  some  higher  function  than  that  of  the 
reflective  understanding,  and  if  we  know  an  absolute 
at  all,  we  must  know  it  by  a  faculty  reaching  quite 
beyond  conscious  experience. 

There  can,  then,  be  no  alternative ;  if  we  keep  the 
old  logic  we  must  keep  out  the  new  absolute.  But,, 
if  we  keep  the  force,  as  both  science  and  philosophy 
surely  will,  then  must  we  have  some  faculty  higher 
than  reflective  thought  with  which  to  make  out  its 
relations,  and  to  determine  its  modes  of  being  and 
efficiency  of  action.  The  logic  retained  and  the  force 
assumed  cannot  stand  together. 

It  would  be  in  place,  and  an  easy  task,  to  show 
here,  in  a  variety  of  particular  defects  and  their  re- 
sults, the  utterly  unsatisfactory  position  in  which  this 
logic  of  force  is  left ;  but  from  the  duplicity  already 


LOGIC   OF  FORCE.  91 

exposed  in  it,  the  mere  mention  of  some  of  the  more 
prominent  of  these  deficiencies  will  be  sufficient  to 
make  plain  the  point  of  their  application,  and  also 
to  suggest  others  of  perhaps  not  much  less  impor- 
tance. The  abstract,  relative  space  or  time,  which 
is  all  the  logic  can  recognize,  is  at  the  most  only 
void  place  or  period,  being  only  the  utter  emptiness 
which  it  might  be  imagined  some  coexisting  resist- 
ance could  fill  with  content,  and  thus  be  limited  by 
surfaces  for  place  and  by  instants  for  period  that  then 
would  resist  and  make  the  place  and  period  palpable  ; 
whereas  the  true  space  and  time  are  already  illimita- 
ble forms  for  all  limited  place  and  period,  from  which 
no  point  can  be  taken  out  and  to  which  no  point  can 
be  added,  and  which  must  already  be,  or  no  possible 
place  or  period  could  be.  —  And  so  again,  the  relative 
force  supposed  is  only  the  result  of  force  already  in 
action,  and  at  best  but  an  index  of  the  veritable  force 
that  is  working  back  of  the  musular  tension.  The 
true  force  will  be  recognized  by  the  appropriate 
faculty  as  readily  in  the  contracting  muscle  of  an- 
other's hand  which  is  in  resistance  to  mine  as  in  my 
own  with  conscious  tension,  or  even  in  the  meeting 
impulse  of  two  billiard  balls  with  no  sensitive  muscu- 
lar contraction.  The  true  force  can  never  be  brought 
into  any  sense-experience,  and  so  can  never  be  an  ob- 
ject of  consciousness,  and  if  empirical  consciousness  be 
ultimate,  all  conception  of  force  is  impossible,  even  an 
indefinite  impression  and  consciousness  of  it. —  And 
so  also  with  matter  and  motion  as  relative  in  con- 


92  ABSTRACT  LOGIC. 

sciousness ;  they  are  symbols  of  the  absolute  matter 
and  motion  in  the  unknown  force  above  conscious- 
ness, and  if  we  have  not  a  higher  faculty  than  con- 
scious reflection  upon  remembered  experience,  no 
forces  working  in  and  around  us  will  ever  be  cognized 
by  us,  and  no  knowledge  of  what  matter  and  motion 
essentially  are  can  be  even  relatively  to  experience 
attained  by  us.  — And  lastly  here,  by  the  new  side  of 
the  logic,  we  have  the  evolution  from  the  unknown 
absolute  force  alike  of  both  physical,  vital,  and 
intellectual  phenomena ;  and  can  therefore  recognize 
nothing  of  human  freedom,  nor  morality  beyond 
utility,  nor  religious  worship  of  a  divine  Personality, 
nor  may  there  be  any  supposition  of  a  miracle,  which 
would  unsettle  the  last  ground  of  scientific  trust  in 
the  invariable  order  of  nature ;  and  yet  such  trust  is 
only  from  what  experience  finds  has  been,  not  at  all 
that  any  truth  or  wisdom  precedent  to  the  experience 
required  that  so  it  should  have  been. 

These  last  issues  will  be  admitted  by  the  votaries  of 
the  logic  themselves  and  defended  by  as  plausible  ex- 
planatory considerations  as  may  be,  but  they  necessa- 
rily originate  from  the  deficiencies  of  a  logic  founded  on 
mere  sense-experience  in  consciousness  -,  and  though 
no  unwelcome  consequences  will  force  an  honest  rnirid 
from  avowing  all  that  his  adopted  logic  demonstrates, 
yet  no  comprehensive  intelligence  can  permit  itself  to 
be  satisfied  with  these  intrinsic  pugnacities  to  his 
deepest  sensibilities,  and  will  in  them  find  occasion  to 
distrust  the  logic  that  imposes  such  an  internal  con- 


LOGIC   OF  FOECE.  93 

flict.  The  determination  that  essential  force  is  sub- 
stantial matter  we  recognize  as  important  for  philoso- 
phy as  for  science,  yet  neither  can  intelligently  avail 
themselves  of  it  in  face  of  the  absurdities  from  the 
logic  made  to  accompany  it,  and  the  highest  service  to 
both  will  be  the  clear  presentation  of  a  deeper  and 
firmer  logical  basis  for  their  support,  and  by  the  fore- 
going cursory  criticisms  we  come  more  clearly  in  sight 
of  what  is  demanded  for  such  an  undertaking,  and 
with  better  preparation  to  appreciate  what  may  in- 
telligibly be  presented. 


PART  II. 

LOGIC   OF   CONCRETE   UNIVERSALITY. 

PREREQUISITE  CONDITIONS.  —  The  comprehensive 
trait  of  all  the  forms  of  Logic  hitherto  considered  has 
been,  a  taking  of  experience  in  its  particulars  and 
thence  abstracting  and  gradually  generalizing  them 
to  a  universal.  Individuals  are  observed  with  their 
many  characteristics,  their  idiosyncracies  are  over- 
looked and  the  attributes  common  to  many  are  noted, 
and  these  individuals  with  common  attributes  are 
classed  together.  Abstraction  of  still  fewer  common 
attributes  is  further  made,  and  thus  generalizations 
through  species  and  rising  genera  are  taken  till  a  uni- 
versal is  reached  to  which  all  species  and  genera  are 
subordinate,  and  in  this  the  purely  abstract  conception 
is  found  which  has  no  attribute  left  to  be  predicated 
of  it.  Among  the  advantages  of  this  process  of  ab- 
straction are,  a  ready  and  complete  classification  of 
empirical  phenomena,  the  attainment  of  comprehen- 
sive judgments,  and  the  capability  to  deduce  the 
attributes  of  every  particular  from  the  more  general 
conception.  Among  the  necessarily  attendant  dis- 
advantages are,  the  shutting  of  all  knowledge  within 
experience,  the  knowledge  growing  less  definite  as 

95 


96  CONCEETE   LOGIC. 

we  rise  towards  universality,  and  that  we  ultimately 
come  to  a  pure  abstraction  of  which  nothing  can 
be  predicated  and  about  which  no  judgment  can  be 
formed.  The  higher  we  rise  ihe  less  we  know, 
consequently  the  best  way  is  to  stand  still  at  the 
start,  for  the  necessary  termination  is  utter  nesci- 
ence. At  the  best  we  know  just  what  appears  and 
just  as  it  appears,  but  at  the  end  of  the  abstracting 
and  generalizing  process  we  can  have  nothing  but 
empty  subject  with  absent  predicates.  This  may  be 
called  an  Absolute,  but  it  is  absolution  from  all  rules 
of  thought  and  judgment. 

It  is  not  possible  to  satisfy  the  human  mind  with 
this  abstract  logical  process.  The  brute  takes  sense- 
appearance  as  it  is,  and  never  asks  concerning  any 
experience,  From  whence  did  it  come  ?  Whither  does 
it  go  ?  Or  who  has  made  it  ?  But  even  from  hu- 
man childhood  the  restless  questionings  of  all  things 
around  it  are,  Where  did  this  come  from  ?  What  is  it 
for  ?  And  who  made  it  ?  And  no  delusive  replies 
nor  chiding  rebukes  can  repress  the  wonder  or  its 
struggling  impulses.  Humanity  has  its  inborn  rea- 
son which  knows  its  rights,  and  claims  its  preroga- 
tive both  to  seek  and  receive  an  honest  answer.  But 
such  honest  and  satisfactory  answer  cannot  be  given 
by  any  abstract  logic.  Whether  we  assume  a  pure 
thought-activity  or  muscular  co-resistance,  the  abstrac- 
tion of  them  from  experience  and  generalizing  them 
to  a  universal  will  oblige  us  to  carry  over  into  the 
province  of  the  absolute,  in  either  case,  all  the  limi- 


rnw. 


PEEKEQUISITE   CONDITIONS.  97 

tations  of  the  relative  and  which  must  involve  us  in 
perpetual  contradictions  and  inextricable  perplexity. 
Whether  thought-process  or  convertible  force  be 
adopted,  an  absolute  must  be  assumed  at  last,  for  if 
thought  be  of  the  relative  it  cannot  satisfactorily  rest 
in  the  relative,  and  in  passing  on  to  the  assumption 
of  an  absolute  neither  the  logic  of  one  nor  the  other 
can  carry  along  with  it  anything  which  is  not  adapted 
exclusively  to  deal  with  relatives  only. 

We  shall  entirely  reverse  the  process  from  abstrac- 
tion to  concretion,  and  instead  of  a  generalized  expe- 
rience we  shall  make  an  integration  of  experience 
that  will  hold  all  parts  together  in  their  entireness. 
We  shall  need  experience  as  radically  and  use  it  as 
extensively  as  do  any  systems  of  abstract  logic,  but 
we  work  in  experience  with  another  intellectual 
faculty  and  in  a  different  manner.  We  put  the  in- 
sight of  reason  to  read  in  the  facts  of  experience  what 
has  been  conditional  for  it,  and  thereby  know  what 
must  have  preceded  it,  and  determined  the  order  of 
inherent,  adherent,  and  coherent  connections  in  all' 
phenomenal  observation.  We  begin  with  a  purely 
formal  experience  and  pass  on  through  the  most  com- 
plicated substantial  appearances,  and  keep  all  the  ele- 
ments and  attributes  together  till  the  last.  Instead 
of  diminishing  our  predicates  with  the  extending  of 
our  judgments,  as  we  do  by  abstraction,  we  multiply 
them  by  concretion,  and  make  every  rising  category 
richer  in  attributes  and  the  judgment  fuller  in  predi- 
cates. The  unifying  bond  begins  in  the  simplest, 
7 


98  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

and  colligates  all  in  one  in  the  completest  experience, 
and  so  all  existence  is  held  in  absolute  integration 
universally  and  eternally.  Each  successive  stage  will 
have  its  own  evidence,  but  the  clearer  light  and  con- 
viction will  come  in  the  consummation  of  the  logical 
process. 

Further  on  we  will  take  short  occasion  to  note,  why 
reflective  abstraction  and  generalization  cannot  be 
extensive  without  the  help  of  reason ;  we  here  only 
state  of  our  proposed  logic  of  concretion  and  integra- 
tion, that  though  from  the  activity  of  a  truly  reflec- 
tive agency,  yet  this  cannot  be  practically  exerted  to 
any  purposes  of  extensive  intelligence  except  as  the 
reflection  shall  be  prompted  and  controlled  by  the 
reason.  The  insight  of  the  reason  avails  to  the  attain- 
ment of  somewhat  that  was  earlier  and  deeper  than 
the  appearances,  and  was  also  a  necessary  prerequi- 
site for  the  intelligible  experience  which  is  to  be 
stated  in  distinct  thought,  and  only  in  the  light  of 
these  necessary  preconditions  can  the  clear  thought- 
construction  be  stated.  Except  as  we  shall  take  sepa- 
rate portions  of  experience  consecutively  into  consid- 
eration, we  leave  the  work  of  abstraction  wholly  out 
.•of  account  as  any  part  essential  for  our  logic,  and 
rely  wholly  upon  the  coalescing  or  integrating  activ- 
ity, under  the  teaching  of  reason,  for  our  entire  con- 
structing process.  The  practical  completion  of  the 
process  can  alone  bring  out  a  full  conception  of  what 
the  agency  is  and  how  it  works,  yet  a  short  prelim- 
inary description  and  statement,  adequate  to  some 


PREREQUISITE  CONDITIONS.  99 

incipient  apprehension  of  it  and  its  method  of  applica- 
tion, will  be  here  useful. 

We  do  not  contemplate  the  human  reason  as  stand- 
ing alone  and  isolate  from  all  other  being,  and  hold 
that  by  itself  an.d  from  itself  it  foresees  coming  expe- 
riences, for  it  is  no  work  of. the  inspired  seer  and 
prophet  that  we  attempt  to  expound,  or  that  in  any 
way  we  make  analogous  to  our  attainment  of  the 
knowledge  of  experience.  Not  an  independent,  self- 
originated  d  priori  knowledge  from  pure  reason,  but 
with  a  given  form  of  experience  in  contemplation  by 
the  reason,  we  affirm  and  strenuously  maintain  that 
the  human  mind  is  competent  to  apprehend  more 
than  the  facts  consciously  given  in  experience ;  and 
can  do  more  with  these  facts  than  to  take  abstracts 
from  them,  or  to  put  their  common  attributes  into 
class-conceptions,  or  to  deduce  particular  judgments 
from  general  premises  ;  that  it  is  competent  to  look 
into  and  through  the  various  conscious  facts  and.  find 
an  inner  meaning  specifically  expressed  by  each,  and 
read  there  a  true  story  of  much  that  must  have  been 
first,  or  that  experience  itself  could  not  have  been. 
There  are  truths  older  than  the  conscious  experience, 
and  which  had  their  determining  influence  in  secur- 
ing the  ordering  of  the  experience  to  come  within 
consciousness  as  it  has,  and  these  are  indicated  in  the 
experience  itself  as  the  lesson  which  it  contains.  The 
empirical  facts  are  the  expressive  symbols  of  the 
meaning,  and  their  coincidence  and  perpetual  concord- 


100  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

ance  is  an  undeniable  evidence  that  the  sense-sym- 
bol and  the  expressed  meaning  were  put  together  to 
the  end  of  their  intelligible  comprehension.  The 
meaning  is  no  component  part  of  the  symbol  which 
can  be  abstracted  from  it  and  predicated  of  it  in  a 
logical  judgment  or  a  deduction  therefrom,  for  it  is 
its  inner  life  and  spirit,  without  which  the  whole  is 
but  a  dead-letter.  This  meaning  is  not  addressed  to 
and  cannot  be  interpreted  by  the  reflective  under- 
standing, and  can  be  a  communication  of  no  sig- 
nificance whatever  to  any  other  faculty  than  the 
reason. 

Single  facts  or  disconnected  facts  in  experience 
may  not  sufficiently  express  their  meaning  in  many 
cases,  but  the  leading  facts  together  carefully  ex- 
amined will  be  found  to  be  such  a  sufficiently  plain 
utterance  of  their  truth  that  they  need  not  be  unmean- 
ing nor  mistakenly  apprehended.  The  reason  can  see 
in  the  experience  the  necessary  conditions  which  pre- 
ceded it  and  were  the  prerequisite  for  it,  and  no  facts 
in  experience  are  truly  known  until  they  are  thus 
comprehended  in  the  conditions  which  made  them 
possible,  and  necessarily  as  they  are,  and  as  through 
their  conditions  seen  to  be  the  fulfilment  of  a  pur- 
pose. 

In  such  way  the  whole  experience  becomes  known, 
and  its  facts  are  no  longer  mere  appearance.  We 
have  its  inner  significancy  without  mistake  and  be- 
yond contradiction.  This  will  make  the  three  follow- 


PREREQUISITE  CONDITIONS.  101 

ing  forms  of  conditions  necessary  to  be  read  in  all 
comprehensible  experiences :  — 

1.  CONDITIONS  WITHOUT  WHICH  THE  EXPERIENCE 
CANNOT  BE. 

2.  CONDITIONS  WITH  WHICH  SUCH   EXPERIENCE 

MUST  BE. 

3.  CONDITIONS    so    EVENTUATING  AS   EVINCIVE 

OF  A  PROPOSED  END. 

Where  these  are  clearly  seen  conspiring  in  any 
ordered  experience,  we  shall  never  have  any  hesita- 
ting convictions. 

Ordinarily,  experience  is  understood  of  that  which 
comes  within  consciousness  through  sense,  but  there  is 
also  a  higher  meaning  where  the  insight  has  truth  in 
its  own  light,  and  which  is  distinctively  reason-expe- 
rience. We  must  thus  distinguish  three  states  of 
knowing  relatively  to  experience,  and  which  will  be 
determinative  of  our  logical  method. 

I.  EXPERIENCE  WITH  PURE  FIGURE  AND  INOR- 
GANIC BODY  ;  including  the  categories  of  Quantity, 
Quality,  and  Relation. 

II.  EXPERIENCE  WITH  ORGANIC  BEING;  includ- 
ing instinctive,  sensitive,  and  rational  activity. 

III.  ABSOLUTE  BEING  ;  as  above  all  finite  experi- 
ence. 


102  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 


PURE   FIGURE   AND  INORGANIC   BODIES. 

I.  EXPEDIENCE  IN  CONCEETE  PUKE  QUANTITY. 
—  The  experience  we  here  contemplate  is  that  of 
mathematical  construction  of  pure  Figure,  which  is 
restricted  within  the  subjective  consciousness,  as  mere 
mental  activity  guided  by  the  light  of  reason  in  the 
arithmetical  calculus  of  numbers  and  in  geometrical 
forms.  The  following  are  the  leading  items  of  such 
experience,  in  which  the  insight  of  reason  may  read 
their  prerequisite  conditions : 

1.  The   experience  is  confined   to  pure  Quantity 
quite  regardless  of  any  Quality. 

2.  In  Arithmetic,  as  calculus  of  numbers,  the  arith- 
metical functions  apply  to  the  pure  units  regardless 
of  their  magnitudes ;  the  sum  or  difference,  product 
or  quotient,  having  the  same  computations  whether  the 
units  stand  for  atoms  or  worlds,  seconds  or  centuries. 

3.  In  Geometry,  the  elements  recognized  are  points, 
lines,  surfaces,  and  volumes.     The  point  has  position, 
the  line  has  contiguous  points  in  succession,  the  sur- 
face has  contiguous  lines  in  the  same  plane,  and  the 
volume  has  an  enclosing  surface.     Solids  are  surfaces 
superimposed. 


PURE  FIGURE  AND   INORGANIC   BODIES.         103 

4.  In  Mechanics,  motion  is  taken  as  commensurable 
with  force,  and  this  is  computed  mediately  through 
the  place  passed  over  or  the  period  passed  through. 

5.  The  figure  is  within  its  limits,  as  the  angle  is  the 
point  at  the  opening  of  its  enclosing  lines,  the  area  is 
the   plane   within  the  lines,   and  the  volume  is  the 
place  within  the  enclosing  surfaces. 

6.  The  known  perfection  of  a  figure  is  by  its  ac- 
cordance with  its  determining  idea,  as  a  circle  by  the 
circumvolution  of  a  line  about  its  terminal  point,  a 
sphere  by  the  revolution  of  a  circle  upon  its  diameter, 
or  a  cone  by  the  revolution  of  a  right-angled  triangle 
about  one  of  the  sides  containing  the  right-angle.    All 
similar  figures,  as  circles,  spheres,  cones,  squares,  &c., 
are  each  to  each  relatively  proportional. 

7.  Demonstration  is  made  practicable  by  construct- 
ing diagrams  in  which  intuition  may  pass  from  step  to 
step  through  the  whole  process. 

8.  All  constructed  magnitudes  have  definite  place 
and  period,  and  places  and  periods  are  known  as  in 
Space  and  Time  ;  but  the  Space  and  Time  are  known 
only  as  given  through   place  and  period  ;  for  when 
place  and  period  pass  from  consciousness,  the  knowl- 
edge of  Space  and  Time  in  which  they  were  passes 
away  with  them. 

9.  Figures  made  coincident  in  place  and  period  lose 
their  distinct  individuality,  and  the  many  become  but 
one. 

10.  When  two  figures  coincide  in  parts  of  their 
limits,  the  limits  are  to  that  extent  abolished. 


104  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

11.  Figures  constructed  in  place  can,  in  thought,  by 
its  own  energy,  be  moved  to  another  place  without  a 
reconstruction. 

12.  Old  figures  abolished  from  consciousness,  and 
then  new  figures  constructed  in  consciousness,  it  be- 
comes impracticable  to  know  that  the  places  and  pe- 
riods of  the   former  were  in  a  common  Space   and 
Time  in  which  are  now  the  places  and  periods  of  the 
latter. 

These  facts  in  mathematical  experience,  carefully 
considered,  will  give  abundant  occasion  for  the  insight 
of  reason  to  read  in  them  many  prerequisites  which 
must  have  been  determinative  of  them.  But  before 
presenting  their  precedent  necessary  conditions  for  an 
experience,  it  is  quite  possible  and  for  some  purposes 
desirable  here  to  rule  out  the  acts  of  formal  abstrac- 
tion as  of  no  logical  connection  with  true  mathemati- 
cal thinking,  thereby  leaving  a  clear  field  for  a  logic 
founded  upon  concrete  and  integrant  construction. 

If  our  mathematical  figures  must  be  abstracts  from 
phenomenal  experience,  then  experience  is  the  ulti- 
mate test  of  the  truth  of  all  mathematical  demonstra- 
tion. The  doctrine  of  J.  Stuart  Mill  is  stringently 
accordant  with  the  claim  to  such  ultimate  criterion. 
By  such  test  of  abstraction  we  can  know  nothing  fur- 
ther in  mathematical  truth  than  we  have  beforehand 
attained  in  empirical  fact.  We  know  triangles  to 
have  any  two  of  their  sides  greater  than  a  third  side, 
or,  as  the  same  thing,  we  know  a  straight  line  between 
any  two  points  to  be  the  shortest  that  can  be  drawn 


PURE  FIGURE  AND  INORGANIC   BODIES.         105 

from  one  to  the  other,  only  because  we  have  invaria- 
bly in  experience  found  such  to  be  the  fact.  We  do 
not  know  that  parallel  lines  produced  can  never 
meet,  nor  even  that  two  and  two  are  four,  but  as  ex- 
perience has  already  so  taught  us.  All  notions  of 
immediate  intuitions  are  held  to  be  mere  delusions, 
which  are  induced  by  forgetting  and  so  wholly  over- 
looking the  empirical  associations  primarily  attained, 
and  then  credulously  mistaking  what  has  truly  been 
abstracted  from  sense-observation  as  a  direct  behold- 
ing of  universal  and  necessary  truths.  All  pure  fig- 
ures are  but  abstracts  from  perceived  phenomena,  and 
must  be  referred  to  some  actually  limited  and  meas- 
ured object  for  their  truth,  and  no  mathematical  dem- 
onstration can  be  admitted  as  either  more  accurate 
or  more  comprehensive  than  the  copies  in  experience 
from  which  the  abstractions  have  been  taken. 

Still  further  in  refutation  of  the  logic  of  abstrac- 
tion, we  remark  that  the  limits  of  bodies  perceived  by 
the  senses  are  their  outlines  and  surfaces,  and  these 
are  parts  of  the  bodies  themselves  and  belong  to  them, 
and  thus  their  abstraction  as  limits  of  mathematical 
figure  must  make  them  to  be  component  parts  of  the 
figure,  and  we  must  conceive  the  angular  point  to  be 
at  the  limit-point,  and  not  at  the  area-point  between 
the  limits ;  and  in  the  same  way  we  must  hold  that 
the  circle  includes  its  circumference  as  belonging  to 
the  figure,  and  the  volume  of  the  sphere  includes  its 
periphery,  and  every  figure  must  be,  not  within  its 
limits,  but  the  limits  within  the  figure,  and  as  truly 


106  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

belonging  to  it  as  the  superficial  outline  belonged  to 
the  original  body.  If,  then,  equal  figures  be  applied 
each  to  each,  they  must  still  retain  their  respective 
limits  and  cannot  exactly  coincide,  but  must  keep 
their  individual  distinctions.  Were  two  right-angled 
triangles  of  equal  sides  containing  their  right  angles, 
put  counter  each  to  each  with  their  sides  subtending 
the  right-angles  in  contact,  neither  triangle  could  ad- 
mit the  annulment  of  its  hypothenuse,  nor  that  the 
two  should  coalesce  in  a  third  and  become  a  perfect 
square.  And  then  the  fiction  of  attaining  abstrac- 
tions so  pure  that  they  may  have  position  without 
magnitude,  length  without  breadth,  and  surface  with- 
out thickness,  by  which  it  is  designed  to  eliminate  the 
deficiencies  of  impracticable  coincidences,  must  still, 
beside  the  logical  absurdity  of  the  attempt,  be  at  the 
expense  of  mathematical  accuracy,  in.  the  same  way 
as  when  in  transcendental  analysis  the  polygon  is 
supposed  to  multiply  its  sides  into  a  coincidence  with 
a  circle  —  in  all  cases  the  differential  infinitesimal  is 
still  there,  precluding  the  coincidence  as  persistently 
as  the  infinitesimal  surfaces  of  solids  prevent  their 
bodily  concretion. 

And  then  again,  in  the  experience  before  abstrac- 
tion, a  perfectly  formed  circle  or  other  figure  could 
never  be  determined  by  any  practical  measurement 
but  by  conforming  to  some  supersensual  idea,  like  the 
circumvolving  line  for  a  circle,  &c.,  which  idea  must 
be  first  mentally  constructed,  and  brought  to  the 
sense  object,  and  its  perfection  so  ascertained  before 


PURE  FIGURE  AND   INORGANIC   BODIES.         107 

a  perfect  abstract  can  become  a  copy  of  it.  The  ab- 
solutely perfect  must  be  carried  to  the  sense  phenom- 
enon, or  it  can  never  be  taken  from  it.  And  then, 
further  still,  when  an  abstraction  is  made  that  is  quite 
void  of  all  sense-content,  and  there  is  attained  pure 
place  or  pure  period,  the  abstraction  has  not  attained, 
nor  in  any  way  can  attain,  Space  and  Time.  Pure 
place  is  not  Space  and  pure  period  is  not  Time,  for 
the  place  is  in  Space  and  the  period  in  Time.  The 
place  has  extension,  and  the  period  has  succession, 
but  Space  instead  of  being  itself  extended  has  already 
all  extension  in  it,  and  Time  instead  of  being  succes- 
sive already  contains  all  succession.  Space  is  no  out- 
stretching, but  all  outstretching  is  within  it,  and  it 
must  first  be  in  order  that  any  extending  can  be  ; 
and  so  Time  is  no  onflowing,  but  all  onflowing  is 
within  it,  and  it  must  first  be  in  order  that  any  flow- 
ing successions  can  be.  All  abstractions  from  exten- 
sion and  succession  are  but  empty  place  and  period, 
and  all  further  attempted  abstraction  is  utter  empti- 
ness, which  can  give  no  distinction  between  Space  and 
Time  themselves,  nor  determine  any  places  or  periods 
within  them.  We  do  not,  therefore,  discard  abstract 
logic  arbitrarily  ;  it  is  intrinsically  delusive,  and  hope- 
lessly, helplessly  defective.  We  come  back  then  to 
our  recognized  experience  of  pure  mathematical 
Quantity  as  intrinsically  concrete,  and  proceed  to 
subject  this  purely  concrete  experience  to  the  insight 
of  reason,  that  we  may  see  exactly  the  conditions 
which  are  determinative  of  it. 


108  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

We  already  know  that  points,  lines,  surfaces,  vol- 
umes, and  angles,  together  with  motion  and  numeral 
units,  make  up  the  elementary  content  of  the  math- 
ematical experience,  and  that  as  they  are  pure  Quan- 
tity, destitute  of  all  sense-Quality,  they  cannot  come 
within  the  consciousness  through  the  medium  of  or- 
ganic perception.  It  is  a  necessary  condition  that 
they  have  their  construction  by  an  intelligent  activity 
working  within  consciousness,  and  so  far  the  con- 
scious constructing  activity  will  be  a  portion  of  the 
experience  itself,  while  that  which  sees  within  the 
whole  experience  the  necessary  conditions  for  it,  must 
come  from  an  intelligence  looking  over  and  beyond 
the  empirical  constructing  to  that  which  determines 
it,  and  must  authoritatively  control  it.  There  will  then 
be  an  activity  directly  engaged  in  constructing  this  ele- 
mentary content,  and  which  must  have  its  guidance 
and  control  from  a  deeper  intelligent  sovereignty. 
We  here  particularly  distinguish  these  subservient 
and  dominant  mental  activities  in  their  order. 

A  point  cannot  come  and  stand  in  my  subjective 
consciousness  except  as  I  assume,  by  a  mental  move- 
ment, a  certain  position  and  there  rest,  when  such 
double-act  in  moving  to  and  resting  in  a  stable  posi- 
tion makes  that  a  fixed  point  in  the  consciousness. 
The  stated  point  consists  in  the  intelligent  act  taking 
and  keeping  the  fixed  position.  The  positing  act  is 
thus  necessarily  not  a  simple  but  a  complex  activity, 
including  counteraction  by  a  positing  and  negating  on 
opposite  sides,  and  thereby  attaining  steadfastness. 


PURE  FIGURE  AND   INORGANIC   BODIES.         109 

So  holding  the  intelligence  in  position,  there  is  the 
conscious  point  with  no  motion  ;  and  conditional  for 
such  posited  point  is  such  counter-activity. 

And  further,  no  line  can  come  within  my  subjective 
consciousness  except  as  I  construct  it,  and  the  con- 
structing activity  will  necessarily  be  a  modification  of 
the  above  described  counter-action.  I  must  so  far 
withhold  the  negative  side  and  give  excess  of  energy 
to  the  positive  side  as  to  secure  the  passing  of  the  ac- 
tivity to  a  contiguous  position,  and  there  again  balance 
itself  in  the  contiguous  point,  and  so  moving  from 
position  to  contiguous  position  successively,  the  con- 
tiguous points  become  a  constructed  line,  and  the  line 
so  constructed  in  consciousness  is  itself  a  complex 
throughout  of  the  discrete  and  continuous  ;  the  points 
are  put  in  unity  by  the  intelligent  movement  and 
statement,  so  that  no  one  falls  away  from  the  pre- 
ceding, and  none  falls  out  of  the  continuous  line,  but 
all  stand  together  as  a  concrete  extended  in  the  con- 
sciousness. Such  complex  activity  of  intention  and 
extension  is  necessarily  conditional  for  the  construc- 
tion of  any  mathematical  line.  This  activity  is  vir- 
tually the  living  movement  of  Hegel's  thought-pro- 
cess, and  which,  instead  of  a  process  of  abstraction 
and  generalization,  has  here  been  seen  in  the  facts  of 
mathematical  experience  itself  an  indispensable  pre- 
requisite in  order  that  such  facts  can  be.  By  care- 
ful inspection  this  whole  constructing  process  can  be 
brought  within  clear  consciousness  whenever  in  sub- 
jective movement  we  describe  a  pure  line  or  fix  a  pure 


110  COKCKETE  LOGIC. 

point.  The  products  are  original  concrete  construc- 
tions and  not  second-hand  abstract  conceptions,  and 
in  such  method  all  mathematical  figures  may  be 
drawn,  and  so  must  be  drawn  if  they  stand  in  subjec- 
tive experience. 

But  we  now  go  further  to  the  attainment  of  a  pro- 
founder  agency.  The  points  in  the  line  are  contigu- 
ous and  so  the  line  is  itself  an  extension,  and  the  con- 
structing activity  was  continuous  in  uniting  the  points, 
and  so  they  stand  in  succession,  the  line  thus  fills  a 
place  and  the  construction  of  it  fills  a  period,  and  con- 
ditional for  pure  place  and  pure  period  in  subjective 
consciousness  is  such  construction  of  extension  and 
succession.  The  line  may  be  made  to  limit  any  place 
and  the  successions  in  it  to  limit  any  period,  and  the 
places  and  periods  are  made  by  their  limits,  and  so  are 
as  their  limits  and  cease  at  their  limits.  These  limits 
may  be  constructed  indefinitely,  but  how  far  soever 
that  may  be,  the  construction  can  only  fill  place  and 
period  as  smaller  or  larger,  and  can  never  get  beyond 
limited  place  or  period.  But  an  insight  into  any  con- 
structed pure  place  or  period  sees,  that  conditional 
for  place  there  must  be  Space  in  which  places  may  be, 
and  conditional  for  period  there  must  be  Time  in 
which  periods  may  be.  Place  is  not  space  and  period 
is  not  time,  the  former  are  in  the  latter.  The  di- 
rectly constructing  activity  gets  the  conscious  place 
and  period,  and  cannot  make  the  consciousness  reach 
over  and  beyond  some  place  and  period.  But  the' 
profounder  insight  does  see  in  any  place  and  period, 


PUBE  FIGUBE  AND  1NOBGANIC   BODIES.         Ill 

that  for  place  it  was  a  prerequisite  there  should  have 
been  space,  and  for  period  a  prerequisite  there  should 
have  been  time,  and  that  both  the  sp'ace  and  the 
time  be  illimitable  and  immutable.  Places  and  pe- 
riods change  in  space  and  time,  but  make  no  changes 
of  space  and  time.  Space  and  time  are  concretes, 
and  no  abstracts  from  phenomenal  experience  can  be 
other  than  void  place  and  period,  and  if  place  and 
period  be  further  generalized  they  become  abstract 
emptiness. 

There  is,  then,  in  concrete  mathematical  experience 
clearly  two  orders  of  intelligent  agency  with  their 
distinct  varieties  of  consciousness,  one  the  immediate 
constructor  of  the  pure  figures  in  their  places  and  pe- 
riods, with  both  the  constructing  activity  and  the 
constructed  pure  figures  in  place  and  period  within 
its  consciousness ;  the  other  is  the  reason,  with  its  in- 
sight into  and  through  these  pure  figures  and  their 
places  and  periods,  and  which  so  attains  illimitable 
and  immutable  space  and  time  as  prerequisite  con- 
ditions that  these  pure  figures  should  have  had  their 
places  and  periods.  The  constructing  agency  has  the 
figures  and  places  and  periods  in  its  consciousness, 
and  can  make  consciousness  reach  no  further ;  the 
reason  puts  all  these  within  its  insight,  and  gets  the 
profounder  consciousness  of  an  Absolute  Space  and 
Time  which  hold  all  these  relative  places  and  periods 
and  their  constructed  limits.  The  first  may  be  con- 
ceived as  if  its  observing  agency  and  consciousness 
were  on  ship-board,  striving  to  arrange  and  fix  con- 


112  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

sistently  in  ordered  experience  all  the  moving  places 
and  periods  and  their  Quantities  amid  the  disturbing 
winds  and  waves  and  counter-currents  which  agitate 
both  it  and  them;  but  the  other  may  be  conceived  as 
if  the  Ocean-bed  were  itself  conscious,  and  steadily 
looked  through  all  that  came  over  it,  and  knew  all 
that  was  in  itself  and  outside  of  it.  From  this  deeper 
consciousness  not  merely  the  relative  facts  appear, 
but  their  necessary  conditions  and  predetermined  con- 
nections are  comprehended.  So  far  as  even  the  finite 
human  reason  reaches  it  knows  more  than  that  which  is, 
it  knows  much  of  that  which  must  be.  Beyond  limited 
places  it  knows  there  must  be  illimitable  space,  and 
beyond  passing  periods  it  knows  there  must  be  per- 
during  time.  Thus  much  of  that  which  is  absolute 
is  brought  clearly  into  mathematical  science,  and  its 
demonstrations  cover  not  merely  the  generalities  ab- 
stracted from  phenomenal  experience,  but  they  in 
elude  truths  absolutely  universal  and  eternal. 

Hegel  calls  the  infinite  which  lies  within  and  beyond 
a  line  in  space,  or  before  and  after  a  period  in  time,  a 
"miserable  infinite,"  inasmuch  as  it  is  only  two 
finites  on  opposite  sides  of  a  limit ;  and  his  assumed 
true  Infinite  is  the  thought-activity  itself,  which  has 
in  it  the  capability  of  an  endless  process ;  but  for 
the  reason-consciousness,  Hegel's  Infinite  is  scarcely 
less  miserable,  for  it  is  but  a  potential  Infinite ;  that 
which  can  be,  but  which  is  not  yet ;  the  reason  space 
and  time  is  an  Infinite  in  each  case,  as  that  which  is 
above  and  beyond  all  limits ;  limitation  and  change 


PUKE  FIGURE  AND  INOKGANIC   BODIES.         113 

cannot  be  of  infinite  space  and  time,  but  of  that  only 
which  is  in  them. 

In  all  mathematical  construction  preliminary  to 
mathematical  demonstration,  the  common  conscious- 
ness, in  which  the  constructing  activity  moves  and 
within  which  the  constructed  pure  figures  are  stated, 
must  ever  be  held  within  the  light  of  the  profounder 
reason-consciousness.  Mathematical  thinking  can  be, 
only  as  the  constructing  activity  is .  prompted  and 
guided  by  the  insight  of  reason,  to  the  end  of  arran- 
ging the  mathematical  diagram  with  its  consecutive 
steps  for  an  intuitive  process,  and  then  passing 
through  that  process  step  by  step  to  the  consumma- 
ted demonstration.  Even  pure  thought  must  travel 
deliberately  and  carefully  its  patient  way  over  the 
very  path  which  opens  to  reason  at  a  glance.  All  is 
thus  within  the  reason-consciousness  of  illimitable 
space  and  time;  the  constructed  limits  are  in  the 
infinite  space  or  time,  and  the  constructed  figures  and 
their  places  or  periods  are  within  the  limits,  and  thus 
as  concrete  Quantities  they,  may,  as  abstract  Quanti- 
ties they  cannot,  have  their  coincidences  of  like  with 
like,  and  each  annul  its  counterpart  limits,  and  the 
two  completely  coalesce  in  some  middle  third  figure. 
The  deeper  consciousness  exactly  comprehends  the 
process  in  its  absolute  universality. 

We  have  thus,  in  full  view,  all  prime  conditions, 
necessary  for  any  exigency  in  pure  mathematical  ex- 
perience. We  know  a  constructing  agency  for  any 
arithmetical  formula  of  numbers  or  for  any  geometri- 
8 


114  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

cal  diagram,  and  we  also  have  the  conscious  places 
and  periods  in  which  they  are  stated  and  limited  ; 
beyond  this  we  also  recognize  a  profounder  function 
that  has  an  immediate  insight,  in  the  places  and 
periods  themselves,  of  the  necessity  that  an  illimita- 
ble space  and  time  should  give  occasion  for  limited 
place  and  period.  In  this  deeper  reason-conscious- 
ness all  is  concretely  present,  and  one  truth  of  its 
kind  is  a  truth  universally,  and  no  possible  experience 
may  violate  the  absolute  demonstrations.  Each  rnind 
will  have  its  own  mathematic,  yef'each  man's  mind, 
so  far  as  its  pure  experience  reaches,  will  have  the 
eternal  mathematic  of  the  Absolute. 

We  may,  then,  unhesitatingly  affirm  that  logic  and 
fact  here  go  together,  and  that  the  necessary  condi- 
tions conspire  in  attesting  both  logic  and  experience. 
Without  the  prerequisites  the  logic  and  facts  cannot 
lbe  ;  with  them  the  logic  and  fact  cannot  fail  to  be  ; 
and  their  complicated  attainment  of  the  end  evinces 
•a  predisposing  purpose.  We  as  little  doubt  the  cor- 
rectness of  the  logic  as  we  do  that  of  the  science 
-itself. 

2.  EXPERIENCE  WITHIN  CONCRETE  QUALITY.  — 
Under  this  category  we  shall  find  the  logic  for  sense- 
•experience,  and  which  will  determine  our  knowledge 
of  phenomena  as  gained  through  organic  Perception. 
The  broad  distinction  between  this  and  the  previously 
considered  mathematical  experience  is,  that  the  latter 
had  its  elements  as  pure  construction  in  subjective 
consciousness  only,  but  here  organic  senses  intervene 


PUKE  FIGURE  AND   INORGANIC  BODIES.        115 

and  present  their  content  to  the  constructing  activity 
as  material  already  given,  and  which  this  activity  is 
to  elaborate  into  clear  and  complete  appearance  in 
consciousness.  The  experience  within  Quality  is  on 
this  account  not  merely  subjective,  but  has  also  emi- 
nently an  objective  significance.  One  is  conversant 
with  pure  figure  alone,  the  other  with  figured  or 
limited  sense-objects. 

Some  of  the  leading  items  of  the  experience  into 
which  we  are  now  to  look  for  .the  discovery  of  its 
necessary  conditions  are  as  follows :  — 

1.  The  five  senses,  with  their  respective  organs  of 
seeing,  hearing,  tasting,  smelling,  and  touching,  the 
touch  subdivided   into   mere   contact   and  muscular 
pressure,  supply  the  content  for  all  appearances. 

2.  These  organs  have  impressions  upon  them  and 
affections  within  them,  preliminary  to  any  perceived 
appearance. 

3.  The  organs  never  give  appearances  which  can  be 
interchangeable  one  within  another. 

4.  Each  complete  appearance  has  its  own  place  and 
period,  but  often  different  appearances  stand  inter- 
fused in  the  same  place  and  period. 

5.  All  that  stand  thus  interfused  within  the  same 
place  and  period  are  apprehended  as  one  body,  and 
the  different  appearances  are  deemed  to  be  distinct 
qualities  of  that  body. 

6.  Successive    modifications  of    the    qualities    are 
deemed  to  be  changes  of  the   body. 

7.  While  many  qualities  may  be  in  the  same  body 


116  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

at  the  same  period,  no  two  bodies  can  be  in  the  same 
place  at  the  same  period. 

8.  Bodies  in   their  places  and  periods   may  stand 
contiguously    and    remain    continuously,    and    their 
many  places  and  periods  may  be  aggregated  into  an 
augmented  place  or  period,  but  no  augmentation  of 
place  and  period  can  transcend  some  limit. 

9.  Perceived  bodies  in  place  and  period  stand  in  a 
Space  and  Time  which  may  contain  all  bodies  that  can 
possibly  be  perceived  in  their  places  and  periods. 

10.  Bodies   once   perceived   may  be   remembered, 
and  their  recollection  will  be  a  present  representation 
of  a  past  perception. 

The  above  characteristics  of  sense-experience  will 
give  an  adequate  occasion  for  the  insight  of  reason 
to  unmistakably  read  its  prerequisitions.  Hegel,  in 
his  Phenomenology,  began  with  sense-organs  already 
affected,  and  yet  on  coming  in  his  process  to  the 
point  of  reflective  consciousness,  he  had  then  dropped 
out .  all  organic  sensation  as  having  no  permanent 
certitude,  and  thence  onward  the  knowing  and  the 
known  are  in  and  of  one  thought-activity  alone.  We 
have  before  noted  that  this  omission  of  sensation  was 
an  arbitrary  or  an  unwitting  neglect,  since  sense-affec- 
tion is  ever  in  a  mode  that  indicates  some  foreign 
agency.  It  is  as  important  to  keep  note  of  the  pres- 
sure of  experience  upon  us  as  of  the  activity  which 
directly  works  experience  within  us.  Except  there 
be  some  organ  there  can  be  no  sense-impression,  and 
so  no  awakened  sensation.  Fancy,  imagination,  and 


PUKE  FIGUKE  AND  INORGANIC   BODIES.         117 

memory,  may  have  reconstructions  occasioned  by 
former  impressions,  but  organic  affection  is  condi- 
tioned upon  nerve-irritation,  and  it  is  through  sensa- 
tion thus  excited  that  we  come  to  the  recognition  of 
sense-qualities.  But  beyond  this,  that  which  we  are 
now  most  concerned  in  considering  is  the  inadequacy 
of  mere  sensation  to  attain  to  complete  perception. 
No  qualified  object  will  appear  in  consciousness  ex- 
cept as  the  given  sensation  is  previously  further 
wrought  out  to  full  cognition.  The  impressions  hav- 
ing been  given  and  the  affections  induced,  it  is  still 
conditional  that  an  intelligent  agency  work  them  up 
into  full  and  clear  phenomena. 

Sensation  is  at  first  given  in  gross  as  the  commingled 
affections  of  many  organs,  and  this  promiscuously 
mingled  content  must  be  reduced  from  its  manifold- 
ness  into  separate  and  single  apprehensions  as  particu- 
lar qualities,  and  then  these  single  qualities  must  be 
brought  into  collective  order  and  consistency  in  their 
respective  objects.  The  same  constructing  agency 
which  produced  pure  points,  lines,  and  figures,  in 
mathematical  experience  must  here  be  directly  active 
in  elaborating  the  phenomena  of  sense-experience. 

The  first  prerequisite  is  that  of  -Distinction.  Liter- 
ally, to  distinguish  is  to  thrust  a  point  between  hete- 
rogeneous elements,  and  so  separate  what  has  been 
commingled  and  confused.  In  this  case  of  organic 
affections  taken  in  mass,  the  intellectual  act  takes 
position  between  different  affections  in  the  common 
sensory,  and  thereby  discriminates  the  differences. 


118  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

The  mental  act,  as  constructing  a  mathematical  point, 
required  a  positing  and  negating  counter-working  in 
order  to  both  take  and  keep  a  steadfast  position ;  but 
in  sensation,  the  sense-affections  have  intrinsic  differ- 
ences, and  thus  the  distinguishing  act  states  itself  be- 
tween the  differences,  and  steadies  itself  by  their  per- 
sistency, and  thus  a  clear  distinction  is  recognized  so 
far  as  a  dividing  activity  is  carried.  Points  of  demar- 
cation are  put  between  the  same  and  the  different, 
and  the  distinctions  appear  in  consciousness.  The 
quality  will  have  its  distinctions  in  kind  when  the 
sensation  is  discriminated  according  to  the  organs 
affected,  each  organ  having  its  own  generic  appear- 
ance, as  color  pertains  to  the  eye,  and  sound  to  the 
ear,  while  the  quality  will  have  its  distinctions  in 
variety  by  dividing  the  affections  as  differing  in  the 
same  organ,  like  the  colors  through  all  the  separations 
of  the  spectrum,  or  the  sounds  in  all  divided  tones. 
When  the  differences  in  sensation  are  thus  exhausted 
the  work  of  distinction  is  completed,  and  all  kinds 
and  varieties  of  phenomena  become  consciously  recog- 
nized. 

The  second  prerequisite  for  Perception  is  Definition. 
To  define,  is  to  limit  on  all  sides ;  and  here  for  in- 
telligent apprehension  the  constructing  activity  is 
carried  clearly  about  the  quality  in  a  line  or  covering 
surface,  and  so  shuts  in  each  distinctive  single  by 
itself.  When  all  distinct  qualities  have  so  also  been 
made  definite  qualities,  the  whole  constructive  work 
of  phenomenal  perception  is  completed,  and  nothing 


PUKE   FIGURE  AND   INORGANIC  BODIES.        119 

further  is  needed  for  complete  single  appearance  in 
consciousness.  The  distinctive  act  is  specially  con- 
ditional for  observation,  since  it  sets  the  distinctive 
qualities  obversely  in  consciousness,  and  the  defining 
act  may  specially  be  known  as  attention,  inasmuch  as 
it  stretches  itself  around  or  completely  over  the  ob- 
served phenomena.  Both  are  necessary  for  complete 
perception  ;  and  when  obscurity  occurs,  it  is  easy  to 
mark  whether  the  deficiency  occurs  in  the  distinguish- 
ing or  in  the  defining. 

A  third  prerequisite  is  the  embodying  of  Qualities. 
When  quality  of  a  certain  kind  has  appeared,  there  is 
ever  an  occasion  for  quality  of  another  kind  to  appear 
in  consciousness ;  and  where  all  organs  are  open  to 
impressions,  no  one  kind  or  variety  can  so  seclude 
itself  as  to  exclude  others.  On  this  account  even 
distinct  and  definite  qualities  may  yet  interpenetrate 
each  other  in  collocation,  or  run  on  concurrent  in  suc- 
cession. The  defining  activity,  having  already  given 
single  qualities  place  and  period,  may  then  put  many 
other  single  qualities  into  the  same  place  and  period. 
Color,  sound,  touch,  &c.,  may  appear  together  in  one 
place  and  period ;  and  again,  diverse  other  kinds 
and  varieties  may  be  gathered  in  groups  in  their  re- 
spective places  and  periods,  and  so  there  may  be  defi- 
nite groups  in  the  same  way  as  definite  single  quali- 
ties. When  a  certain  group  of  diverse  kinds  and 
varieties  of  quality  appear  invariably  the  same  to- 
gether in  their  place  and  period,  even  perception  so 
far  takes  thought  as  to  deem  the  persistent  assem- 


120  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

blage  to  be  one  thing,  and  the  whole  is  apprehended 
as  an  individual  object.  Discursively  and  singly,  and 
yet  collectively  in  one  place,  the  sense  finds  in  an 
Orange  the  roundness,  and  fragrance,  and  yellow,  and 
acid,  &c.,  and  these  persisting  in  their  period  invari- 
ably the  same  in  the  consciousness,  the  perceiver  at 
once  embodies  them  together,  and  as  he  deems  them 
one  body,  so  he  gives  them  one  name,  and  the  many 
qualities  are  but  the  several  characteristics  of  the  same 
individual.  The  sense  can  recognize  no  intrinsic 
connection,  but  can  clearly  apprehend  local  and  peri- 
odic relations,  and  so  distinguishes  and  defines  col- 
lated and  coetaneous  objects  as  distinct  and  definite 
bodies.  The  many  qualities  belong  to  the  one  em- 
bodied thing. 

And  now  these  bodies  differ  in  their  magnitudes  and 
duration,  and  thus  fill  smaller  and  larger  places  and 
periods,  and  so  far  as  experience  reaches,  the  places 
of  each  may  be  determined  relatively  to  the  whole 
in  place  and  period ;  but  this  can  give  place  only 
within  larger  place  and  period  within  larger  period, 
the  largest  of  which  will  still  be  within  known  limits, 
and  no  perception  of  objects  can  attain  a  consciously 
unlimited  space  and  time.  The  constructive  imagi- 
nation may  run  out  to  any  extended  conception  of 
body  in  its  place  and  period,  but  at  furthest  stretch 
the  conception  has  its  limits,  and  no  constructing 
agency,  prospective  or  reflective,  can  recognize  a  space 
and  a  time  within  which  all  possible  limits  must  be. 
And  here,  just  as  with  mathematical  experience,  the 


PURE  FIGURE  AND  INORGANIC   BODIES.        121 

reason's  insight  recognizes  that  neither  smaller  nor 
larger  places  and  periods  can  be,  except  as  there  also 
be  unlimited  space  and  time  to  contain  them  and 
their  limits.  In  any  bodies  perceived  in  places  and 
periods,  reason  immediately  reads  illimitable  and  im- 
mutable space  and  time  with  neither  hesitation  nor 
mistake. 

And  here  is  good  occasion  for  expounding  the 
human  capacity  for  abstract  generalization.  The 
mere  sense-activity  in  its  reflection  can  make  abstrac- 
tions. The  brute  can  regard  some  qualities  and  re- 
ject others,  and  can  derive  conclusions  from  abstract 
remembrances,  and  so  guide  its  conduct  by  past  gen- 
eral experience.  But  this,  as  compared  with  man,  is 
only  to  a  partial  and  confined  measure.  The  brute  is 
able  to  hold  past  experience  but  very  incompletely  in 
memory,  and  can  put  objects  together  in  relation  to 
each  other  and  to  itself  merely  as  its  remembered  ex- 
perience has  found  and  retained  them.  It  has  no 
faculty  which  may  take  all  experiences  in  place  and 
period  and  hold  the  whole  in  one  space  and  one  time, 
and  so  take  a  steady  universal  retrospect.  Man  puts 
his  and  all  men's  experience  into  unlimited  space  and 
time  and  holds  all  in  one,  and  can  thus  reflect  delib- 
erately, and  make  universal  abstractions  and  general- 
izations. The  reflective  understanding  is  the  direct 
agent  in  abstraction,  but  man's  rational  insight  and 
oversight  guides  the  practical  activity  effectively  and 
extensively.  Reason  alone  gives  to  man  his  superior 
capability  of  abstraction ;  and  while  reason  distin- 


122  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

guishes  man  from  the  animal  specifically,  in  abstrac- 
tion the  difference  is  in  degree  only.  The  profouncler 
consciousness  of  reason  has  in  it  the  universal  and 
eternal,  and  can  make  more  complete  and  comprehen- 
sive use  of  the  constructive  and  reflective  agency,  but 
the  constructive  and  reflective  consciousness  is  in  man 
and  brute  of  the  same  kind,  while  man's  superior  en- 
dowment of  the  rational  faculty  greatly  augments  his 
capability  for  abstraction  in  compass  and  clearness. 
But  we  here  regard  a  capacity  for  abstraction,  less 
or  more,  as  of  no  account  for  our  logic.  We  distin- 
guish and  define  sense-affections  into  clear  perception, 
and  put  phenomenal  qualities  into  individual  bodies 
in  place  and  period,  and  then  by  reason's  insight  hold 
all  concretely  in  unchanging  space  and  time,  and  in- 
fallibly know  that  except  on  condition  of  infinite  space 
and  time  there  could  be  place  and  period  for  no  pos- 
sible sense-objects.  We  have  then  again  here  the 
three  varied  conditions  conspiring  to  give  us  a  logic 
for  sense-perception,  and  this  with  valid  convictions 
above  all  gainsaying. 

3.  EXPERIENCE  IN  CONCRETE  RELATION.  —  Per- 
ception, as  an  experience  in  Quality,  is  completed  ill 
Distinction  and  Limitation,  thereby  cognizing  single 
qualities,  and  then  embodying  the  single  qualities  as 
they  stand  interfused  in  place  and  period  into  one  in- 
dividuality, and  such  individual  body  in  its  place  and 
period  the  reason  cognizes  as  in  infinite  space  and 
time  wherein  are  comprehended  all  places  and  periods. 
Reflection  then  ensues,  and  the  relations  of  each  to 


PUKE  FIGURE  AND  INORGANIC  BODIES.        123 

each  and  to  all  are  thought  out  in  specific  judgments, 
and  the  experience  rises  from  separate  appearing 
things  to  a  concretely  connected  nature  of  things  in  a 
universe.  So  far  as  perceptive  experience  can  reach 
we  recognize  bodies  only  in  their  places  and  periods, 
and  can  speak  only  of  their  extensions  and  succes- 
sions, their  collocations  and  concurrences ;  but  beyond 
this  we  attain  a  largely  advanced  and  extended  ex- 
perience, by  the  reflective  activity  of  the  understand- 
ing under  the  illumination  of  reason. 

The  ordinary  work  of  Reflection  may  be  concisely 
given  as  a  turning  of  the  mind  back  upon  objects 
perceived,  and  analyzing  the  bodies  into  their  single 
elements,  and  then,  predicating  these  as  the  several 
characteristics  and  attributes  of  their  respective  bodies, 
we  recognize  them  in  various  forms  of  judgments. 
We  further  note  such  bodies  as  have  together  com- 
mon attributes,  and  abstracting  such  as  are  common 
to  the  many  from  such  as  are  peculiar  to  the  indi- 
vidual, we  make  a  class  of  the  bodies  to  which  the 
attributes  in  common  belong,  and  give  to  it  a  general 
name.  In  the  same  way,  by  appropriating  common 
attributes  to  a  wider  generalization  we  rise  to  more 
comprehensive  judgments,  and  thereby  attain  class- 
relations  in  addition  to  relations  of  place  and  period. 
By  the  logic  of  concrete  relations  we  can  rise  to 
an  experience  of  intrinsic  connections,  by  which 
the  identity  of  subjects  and  predicates  will  be  indis- 
putably established ;  but  in  order  that  we  may  find 
the  necessary  conditions  preliminary  to  the  practica- 


124  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

bility  of  such  transcendental  experience,  we  need  to 
contemplate  some  of  the  prominent  facts  contained  in 
it,  since  only  by  an  insight  into  the  experience  can 
the  reason  read  what  are  the  prerequisites  which 
render  it  possible. 

1.  Some  bodies  continue  of  the  same  appearance  and 
in  the  same  place,  others  change  either  appearance  or 
place,  and  others  change  both  appearance  and  place. 

2.  Some  bodies  have  tendencies  to  move  from  or  to 
each  other,  some  in  polar  directions,  and  some  around 
another  body. 

3.  Some  bodies  tend  to  mutual  composition,  some 
to  dissolution  or  disintegration,  but  in  their  primitive 
elements  the  molecules  maintain  their  integrity. 

4.  The  compound  bodies  are  some  in  cohesion,  some 
in -chemical  combination,  and  some  in  crystallization. 

5.  The  same  body  at  different  periods  may  be  solid, 
or  liquid,  or  vapor,  but .  in  no  two  states  at  the  same 
period. 

6.  Bodies  are  surrounded  or  infused  by  subtle  in- 
fluences which  interact  with  them,  the  bodies  known 
as  material  and  the  subtle  influences  as  ethereal,  like 
heat  and  light. 

7.  The  material  has  impulses  towards  a  centre,  the 
ethereal  has  expulses  from  a  centre,  and  so  matter 
has  gravity  and  ether  has  levity. 

8.  The  surfaces  of  some  bodies,  under  special  modi- 
fications, send  off  influences  in  polar  directions  and 
with  impulsive  or  expulsive  energies,  known  as  elec- 
trical action. 


PURE  FIGURE  AND  INORGANIC   BODIES.         125 

9.  All  known  bodies  and  ethereal  existences  act  and 
react  on  each  other,  and  thus  is  maintained  universal 
communications. 

10.  Loco-motion  perpetually  repeating  ongoing  suc- 
cessions gives  continuous  periods,  especially  revolving 
motion,  which,  as  repeatedly  returning  into  itself,  gives 
measured  periods. 

11.  Changes  in  appearances  as  well  as  in  place  give 
successions,  and  so  have  periods;  but  the  places  and 
periods  which  different  men  may  have  in  consciousness 
cannot  be  in  a  common  space  and  time  for  all,  except 
as  all  come  to  the  same  bodies  for  their  places  and 
periods. 

12.  All  men  have  a  common  space  and  time,  so 
that  all  transactions  in  places  and  periods  may  have 
one  historic  record  from  the  beginning. 

The  above  items  will  suffice  for  attaining  all  needed 
prerequisites  for  related  human  experience. 

If  here  we  should  but  follow  out  the  logic  of  ab- 
straction in  finding  and  taking  attributes  common  to 
'many,  and  so  rising  in  classified  generalizations,  and 
from  them  deducing  particular  syllogistic  conclusions, 
our  most  comprehensive  judgments  could  attain  only 
to  the  sense-relations  of  place  and  period,  and  could 
never  reach  the  certainty  of  any  concrete  connection. 
The  attributes  of  bodies  having  appeared  invariably 
together  in  their  pMce,  and  in  fixed  order  of  succession 
and  communion,  on  this  ground  of  observed  fact  we 
predicate  their  relations  to  their  subject,  but  inasmuch 
as  the  relations  perceived,  and  consequently  the  rela- 


126  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

tions  deduced  and  concluded  can  be  those  of  colloca- 
tion, sequence,  and  concomitance  merely,  it  must  be 
utterly  illogical  to  assume  that  there  are  the  concrete 
connections  of  inherence,  adherence,  and  coherence  in 
airy  possible  judgments.  We  opine,  merely  because 
we  feel  a  constraining  need,  that  there  is  something 
answering  to  our  notions  of  substance,  cause,  and 
counter-causes,  and  deem  long  observed  fact  to  be 
law  of  nature,  but  no  light  of  thought  can  penetrate 
the  perpetuated  experience  and  find  any  reason  for  it. 
Vvre  here  put  abstractions  all  aside,  and  turn  at  once 
to  concrete  and  integrant  connections  determined  as 
prerequisite  and  clearly  intelligible  conditions. 

Organic  impression  and  sense-affection  we  have 
already  found  to  be  necessary  preliminaries  to  dis- 
tinct and  definite  perception,  and  we  now  make  the 
inquiry,  What  is  conditionally  necessary  for  such 
organic  impression  and  sensation?  Mere  thought- 
constructions  can  never  affect  sense-organs.  Neither 
human  nor  divine  thought  can  be  communicated  to  a 
sense-recipient  simply  as  thought,  but  only  when 
uttered  in  some  expressive  way  that  affects  some 
special  sense.  We  speak  not  here  of  any  purely 
spiritual  communion,  but  of  spiritual  communication 
through  sensation,  and  this  must  impress  itself  upon 
sense-organs,  and  induce  affections  in  them  which  no 
thought-activity  can  itself  accomplish.  The  thought 
must  stand  embodied  in  some  material  symbol  in  a 
way  to  impress  itself  upon  some  material  organ,  and 
by  so  much  must  have  an  imparted  energy  over  and 


PURE   FIGURE  AND   INORGANIC  BODIES.         127 

above  the  thinking-activity.  As  the  clearest  ideas 
systematized  into  the  most  consistent  plans  must  have 
an  added  executive  energy  which  embodies  them  in 
matter  before  they  can  be  recognized  by  sentient  in- 
telligences, so  all  recognition  of  nature's  meaning  is 
only  through  overt  material  symbols  impressing  them- 
selves upon  organic  receptivities.  The  spirit  must 
have  the  letter,  the  thought  must  have  the  body,  the 
plan  must  have  the  material  mould  in  nature's  stead- 
fast substance,  and  thereby  the  thinking  must  be 
supplemented  by  an  impressing  energy,  or  nature  can 
impart  nothing  to,  and  be  nothing  for,  any  sentient 
observer.  There  must  be  a  static  energy  embodying 
thought,  and  a  dynamic  energy  impressing  the  static 
symbol  on  sense,  or  there  can  be  no  sense-content  to 
be  distinguished  and  defined  into  sense-perception ; 
and  such  static  and  dynamic  energy  is  Force,  in  both 
respects  conditional  for  any  sense-experience.  Nature 
is  other  and  more  than  clear  and  consistent  thought, 
even  thought  and  plan  expressed  in  static  force,  and 
to  this  all  sentient  intelligence  must  come  and  take 
the  communicated  impression,  or,  to  such,  nature  has 
no  inherent  -meaning,  and  can  impart  nothing  of  her 
hidden  wisdom. 

And  still  further,  inasmuch  as  mere  thinking-act 
cannot  affect  the  sense,  and  only  as  the  thought  is 
embodied  in  static  force,  so  manifestly  it  is  a  further 
prerequisite  that  the  force  be  thoroughly  pervious  to 
thought,  and  the  consistent  plan  and  meaning  pene- 
trate, and  be  so  clearly  suffused  throughout  it,  that 


128  CONCKETE   LOGIC. 

the  static  force  shall  be  an  exact  symbol  of  the 
thought,  and  convey  to  the  sense  its  complete  expres- 
sion. Force  and  thought  must  be  thoroughly  con- 
formable, and  as  much  one  as  the  other  must  be 
determinable  by  logical  rule,  and  only  so  can  any 
reflection  on  sense-perception  attain  knowledge  of 
the  inner  connections  of  nature,  or  acquire  a  true  sci- 
ence of  her  observed  phenomena.  Sense  must  take 
the  impressions,  and  distinguish  and  define  them  in 
clear  consciousness ;  but  the  insight  of  reason,  which 
has  seen  the  force  as  conditional  for  the  perception, 
can  alone  take  the  thought  and  meaning  from  the 
force  and  give  its  true  interpretation.  The  force 
must  be  seen  conformable  to  thought,  and  the 
thought  must  be  seen  expressed  in  the  force,  and 
the  force  underlies  all  phenomenal  arrangements,  and 
so,  carefully  through  reflective  thought,  guided  by 
rational  insight,  we  recognize  Nature's  universal  con- 
nections. 

We  have  not  here  arrived  at  the  position  to  see 
from  whence  the  force  must  come,  but  shall  ultimately 
clearly  attain  it.  We  are  now  in  position  to  see  not 
only  that  static  force  must  be  in  order  to  a  knowledge 
of  the  connections  in  phenomenal  experience,  but  also 
what  the  force  must  be  to  answer  the  ends  of  sym- 
bolizing thought.  The  force  must  be  fashioned  ac- 
cording to  thought,  for  it  must  express  thought  in 
itself,  and  impress  thought  on  organic  sense.  We  have 
already,  by  the  insight  of  reason,  seen  what  is  neces- 
sarily conditional  for  pure  constructed  thought,  and 


PURE  FIGURE  AND  INORGANIC  BODIES.         129 

this  must  be  our  guide  in  attaining  what  must  be  the 
prerequisites  of  force.  In  order  to  take  and  hold  po- 
sition in  pure  thought  we  found  the  necessity  that 
the  constructing  activity  equilibrate  itself  in  the 
counter-energizing  at  the  same  time  of  both  positing 
and  negating,  i.  e.,  putting  itself  in  position  and  ar- 
resting the  positing  energy  at  that  point,  and  only  by 
such  counter-action  could  pure  point  be  constructed  ; 
and  now,  that  force  should  occupy  and  maintain  posi- 
tion, it  is  alike  conditional  that  counter  energies,  of  an 
executive  agency  other  than  thought-activity,  balance 
themselves  in  their  mid-point,  and  there  rest  by  their 
mutual  resistance.  And  then,  as  the  thinking  activity 
moved  in  describing  the  pure  line  in  the  only  manner 
by  putting  an  excess  of  energy  on  the  positing  side 
above  that  of  the  negating  action,  so  force  can  move 
from  its  resting  point  only  on  condition  that  an  excess , 
of  executive  energy  be  given  to  one  side  of  the  coun- 
ter-action, and  in  such  condition  motion  must  follow 
in  a  line  opposite  to  the  excess  of  energy.  Such  bal- 
anced force  is  known  as  ANTAGONIST  FORCE,  and  as 
persistently  at  rest  it  is  static  force.  As  unbalanced 
by  a  one-sided  excess  it  is  still  antagonizing  up  to  the 
balance,  and  as  driving  or  drawing  to  the  degree  of 
excess  it  is  so  far  dynamic  force,  but  whether  static  or 
dynamic  it  is  in  each  case  properly  mechanical  force, 
and  will  stand  or  move  as  persistent  substance  for  all 
sense-affections  and  cause  for  all  changing  phenome- 
nal manifestations,  and  in  such  acceptation  it  is  essen- 
tially Material  force. 
9 


100  CONCRETE  LQGIC. 

Light  and  heat  energize  the  reverse  of  matter,  from 
and  not  toward  a  mid-point,  and  thus  conditional  for 
them  the  energies  must  be  expulses  and  not  impulses , 
yet  as  they  must  reciprocally  work  in  explosive  ac- 
tivity one  with  the  other,  they  constitute  force  driving 
apart  and  not  condensing  as  in  antagonism,  and  so  is 
distinctively  known  as  DIBEMPTIVE  FORCE,  and 
which  will  persist  as  static  when  equally  divellent, 
and  work  as  dynamic  when  one  side  has  an  excess  of 
explosive  energy.  Either  as  static  or  dynamic,  di- 
remptive  force  works  mechanically,  but  as  the  con- 
verse of  material  it  is  known  as  Ethereal  force. 

A  persistent  origination  of  multiplying  energies, 
of  either  impulses  or  expulses  in  a  mid-point,  must 
also  multiply  forces  of  their  respective  kinds  of  work- 
ing about  their  appropriate  points,  and  must  eventu- 
ally balance  themselves  in  full  sphere  about  the  primal 
point  as  a  centre,  and  such  ensphered  accumulation 
of  forces  may  be  known  according  to  their  distinc- 
tions as  atoms,  either  material  or  ethereal. 

In  the  formation  of  the  material  atom  by  antago- 
nism and  persistent  accumulation  of  antagonist  forces 
in  the  central  point,  there  must  -be  a  continual  coming 
in  and  crowding  from  the  mid-point  of  the  succes- 
sively originating  forces,  and  which  must  induce 
another  kind  of  force  as  motion  about  a  centre, 
known  as  REVOLVING  FOECE.  Such  force,  by  careful 
inspection,  will  be  found  conditioned  to  the  direction 
of  the  antagonizing  impulses  of  the  material  forces 
successively  about  their  common  antagonizing  point, 


PURE   FIGURE  AND  INORGANIC   BODIES.         131 

and  in  opposite-handed  helical  circuits  eventuating  in 
the  production  of  the  two  atomic  hemispheres,  which 
as  completed  will  give  to  the  atom  a  bi-polar  energy 
working  opposite-handed  from  the  equatorial  line 
through  the  hemispheres,  and  locking  each  other  in 
mutual  rest  through  the  polar  diameter. 

So  constituted,  each  material  atom  must  have  grav- 
ity in  its  impulses  precisely  according  to  the  empiri- 
cally attained  Newtonian  law,  while  the  ethereal 
atoms  must  each  have  levity  in  the  same  necessary 
ratio.  The  material  atom  must  in  the  necessity  of  its 
method  of  construction  be  a  magnet,  and  its  revolv- 
ing force  must  determine  the  distribution  and  arrange- 
ment of  the  accumulating  atoms  into  masses  working 
into  systems,  and  the  systems  forming .  into  worlds. 
The  interaction  of  all  will  intrinsically  connect  all, 
and  ensphere  all  as  literally  a  universe  turning  on  its 
one  primal  centre,  and  generating  from  it  the  many 
concentric  suns  and  systems. 

This  doctrine  of  concrete  relations,  in  the  intrinsic 
connections  and  combinations  of  distinguishable  forces, 
cannot  be  here  thoroughly  expounded,  and  reference 
must  necessarily  be  made  for  full  explanation  of  this, 
together  with  organic  connections,  to  the  recent  work 
of  "  Creator  and  Creation,"  in  which  is  noticed  the 
composition  of  material  and  ethereal  atoms,  primitive 
insoluble  molecules,  and  the  empirical  phenomena  of 
cohesion,  chemical  combination,  crystallization,  va- 
porization, combustion,  and  electrical  action,  as  ap- 
pearing on  earth,  and  the  observations  evincing  the 


132  CONCRETE   LOGIC. 

presence  of  like  substances  in  other  worlds.  All  in- 
tercorporeal  spaces,  atomic,  telluric,  or  cosmic,  pre- 
sent a  plenum  of  substantial  forces  which  fill  and  fix 
the  universal  sphere,  while  still  the  most  tenuous  and 
the  solid  substances  as  well  are  constructed  of  forces 
thoroughly  pervious  to  thought,  clearly  conceivable 
and  intrinsically  intelligible,  leaving  the  very  essence 
of  substances  and  their  efficient  causality  as  open  to 
rational  insight  as  the  pure  figures  of  constructed 
mathematical  diagrams.  The  conception  of  things 
and  their  attributes  is  in  unity,  and  as  subject  and 
predicate  concluded  in  a  judgment  they  have  not 
merely  relations  of  place  and  period,  but  concrete  in- 
tegration by  intrinsic  connections.  We  have  knowl- 
edge of  their  truly  substantial  inherences,  causal  ad- 
herences,  and  reciprocal  coherences. 

And  lastly,  all  these  material  bodies  and  ethereal 
existencies  we  know  have  overt,  objective  reality. 
They  are  no  product  of  mere  subjective  thought ; 
they  are  neither  fancies,  nor  dreams,  nor  poetic  imagi- 
nings ;  they  all  stand  out  in  one  common  space  and 
time  for  all  humanity,  and  while  each  observer  has  his 
own  phenomenal  facts  in  his  own  consciousness,  yet 
has  every  one  come  to  the  same  stable  extensions  for  his 
space  and  the  same  invariable  successions  for  his  time 
as  all  others  have,  and  so  all  know  they  are  not  dream- 
ing, nor  internally  musing,  but  all  openly  beholding 
the  same  solid  stable  worlds  and  their  phenomena, 
which  have,  and  can  have,  to  all  sense-organs,  no 
place  nor  period  which  is  not  in  the  one  infinite  space 
and  the  one  eternal  time. 


OKGANIC  LIFE  AND  ACTIVITY.  133 

And  here  again  the  three  prerequisite  conditions 
conspire.  Without  the  conditions  the  connections  in 
experience  could  not  be,  with  them  such  experience 
must  be,  and  for  just  such  experience  they  must  have 
been  originally  purposed.  We  thus  establish  a  valid 
logic  for  all  mathematics  and  all  physics  within  what 
is  known  as  the  Mineral  Kingdom. 


II. 

ORGANIC   LIFE    AND   ACTIVITY. 

IN  pure  mathematical  figures  and  in  the  mechani- 
cal forces  hitherto  occupying  our  attention  in  the 
First  Division,  we  could  avail  ourselves  of  construc- 
tive forms  and  movements  in  space,  and  thereby  at- 
tain pure  objects  to  assist  our  conceptions ;  but  in  this 
Second  Division  we  have  to  deal  with  susceptibilities, 
in  their  feelings  and  urgencies  of  want,  appetite,  and 
imperatives,  which  are  independent  of  all  space  and 
cannot  admit  of  constructed  outlines,  and  therefore, 
from  the  necessity  of  the  case,  we  are  forced  back 
upon  the  facts  of  inner  mental  experience  in  con- 
sciousness, that  the  insight  of  reason  may  in  them 
read,  without  a  diagram,  what  is  necessarily  condi- 
tional for  them,  and  for  analogous  experiences  to 
them  which  yet  never  rise  into  consciousness.  While 
thus  our  knowledge  of  Life  must  necessarily  get  less 


134  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

assistance  from  outward  sense  than  our  knowledge 
of  Matter,  still  a  close  speculative  examination  of 
what  is  prerequisite  for  it,  and  in  it,  may  attain  to 
convictions  scarcely  less  satisfactory. 

Organism  is  the  product  of  life,  and  also  an  instru- 
ment in  subserving  the  ends  of  life ;  and  while  the 
most  mature  and  perfect  forms  of  living  activity  are 
in  full  consciousness,  the  earliest  life-work  is  in  dark- 
ness, and  to  the  closing  period  much  of  what  the  life- 
power  does  is  beneath  all  consciousness,  it  will  there- 
fore doubtless  help  to  the  knowledge  of  its  primal 
essence  best,  to  first  get  the  leading  facts  of  life  as 
they  stand  in  highest  consciousness,  next  downward 
through  the  twilight,  and  thence  to  such  as  are  per- 
petually in  darkness  below  it.  We  may  then  study 
the  facts  as  they  stand  distinctively  in  the  different 
Organic  Kingdoms. 

I.    LEADING  FACTS  OF  LIFE  RUNNING  THROUGH 

FROM    CONSCIOUS    TO    UNCONSCIOUS    AGENCY.  —  The 

most  complete  life-action  is  in  the  reason-conscious- 
ness, then  sinking  to  the  less  complete  as  we  have 
lower  consciousness,  and  thence  to  instinct  in  uncon- 
sciousness ;  and  yet  in  all  degrees  of  life-experiences 
a  prompting  urgency  is  determining  the  activity.  We 
may  clearly  note  those  of  the  following  grades  :  — 

i.  Rational  action  in  liberty  has  a  graded  experi- 
ence through  Religion,  Morality,  Philosophy,  and  Art; 
and  a  conscious  urgency,  in  the  claim  of  reason  itself, 
imperatively  puts  force  to  a  fulfilment  of  the  ends 
of  Worship,  Righteousness,  Truth,  and  Beauty. 


ORGANIC  LIFE    AND   ACTIVITY.  135 

ii.  Sense-action  is  fully  within  sense-consciousness 
as  an  experience  under  the  urgency  of  sentient  grati- 
fication, and  it  appetitively  uses  force  in  the  interest 
of  Happiness. 

iii.  Spontaneous  activity  has  no  strictly  defined  limits 
in  consciousness,  since  it  comes  within  it  from  above 
and  sinks  below  it  from  beneath,  and  like  a  passage- 
way to  a  dark  chamber,  admitting  less  and  less  light 
as  we  move  onward.  We  refer  here  to  some  of  its 
successive  grades  of  descent.  Musing  meditation  is 
in  half-consciousness,  so  absorbed  in  subjective  atten- 
tion that  it  becomes  oblivious  to  all  without,  and 
barely  feels  without  heeding  what  is  going  on  within ; 
yet  on  retrospection,  there  is  the  consciousness  that 
the  thought-activity  was  urged  onward  in  the  in- 
terest of  its  own  gratification.  —  In  the  primitive 
facts  of  sensation  and  distinction  and  definitive  con- 
struction of  organic  impressions,  we  are  ordinarily 
unaware  of  both  sensation  and  constructing  action, 
and  only  attain  the  consciousness  in  the  completed 
perception  ;  and  yet  a  close  watch  may  fairly  detect 
an  urgency  from  the  sensation  calling  out  the  energy 
of  construction.  —  Somnambulism  walks  in  sleep,  and 
yet  is  ^not  entirely  heedless.  The  senses  still  direct 
the  steps,  and  the  subject  usually  recalls  some  vague 
uneasiness  that  was  prompting  the  action.  —  Dream- 
ing, also,  is  action  in  sleep,  but  only  in  subjective 
fancy,  and  remembered  dreams  ordinarily  reveal  the 
impulses  of  hope  or  fear  as  urging  to  the  dreaming 
experience.  —  Breathing  is  mostly  unwittingly  per- 


136  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

formed,  and  yet  is  at  all  times  open  to  conscious  ob- 
servation, and  we  thus  know  that  empty  lungs  urge 
to  inhalation  and  full  lungs  to  exhalation.  —  The 
heart's  palpitations  are  deeper  in  unconsciousness,  but 
experiment  shows  that  the  heart-beats  are  in  systole 
and  diastole  as  the  organ  feels  its  fullness  or  empti- 
ness. —  The  peristaltic  intestinal  movement,  and  the 
varied  activities  in  digestion,  assimilation,  secretion, 
&c.,  all  go  on  unconsciously,  and  yet  any  interfering 
disturbances  disclose  an  urgency,  waking  forces  up  to 
the  fulfilment  of  vital  interests. 

iv.  In  reproduction  of  new  organisms,  and  their 
growth  to  maturity  and  preservation  afterwards,  though 
in  each  case  alike  the  activity  is  in  unconsciousness, 
yet  careful  observation  discloses  the  urgency  of  a 
hidden  feeling  controlling  and  using  force  in  the  in- 
terest of  the  organism.  Experiment  and  assisted  ob- 
servation have  found,  that  while  a  few  other  sub- 
stances supplement  them  in  corporeal  constructions, 
yet  only  three  and  in  some  cases  four  substances  in- 
corporate in  complete  chemical  combination,  viz.,  car- 
bon, oxygen,  hydrogen,  with  at  times  the  addition  of 
nitrogen.  The  earliest  vital  activity  observed  is  in 
the  production  of  cellulose  from  a  previous  protoplas- 
tic combination  of  the  above  elements.  This  activity 
appears  in  the  augmenting  and  multiplying  the  uni- 
cellular formations,  and  which  in  continuation  take 
on  varied  forms  of  fibrous  and  vascular  tissue,  gradu- 
ally shaping  the  assimilating  protoplasm  to  the  formed 
embryo,  and  then  maturing  and  perpetuating  the  spe- 


ORGANIC  LIFE  AND  ACTIVITY.  137 

cific  construction.  The  nourishing  elements  existing 
in  many  modified  combinations  are  sought  and  selected 
amid  facilities  or  hinderances  of  procurement,  and  oc- 
casional injuries  occur  to  the  organism,  and  in  all  such 
exigencies  an  urgent  feeling  prompts  in  the  way  to 
the  most  gain,  or  the  least  loss,  or  the  readiest  recu- 
peration to  the  structure.  The  activity  changes,  in 
the  changed  conditions  for  the  need,  by  seizing  ad- 
vantages, avoiding  difficulties,  and  mending  disasters, 
as  promptly  and  directly  as  possible.  The  appropriate 
forces  are  employed  for  the  welfare  of  the  organism 
in  the  right  way  and  place  and  period.  There  is  an 
energetic  urging  which  is  manifestly  a  using  of  me- 
chanical force  to  specific  ends. 

Other  facts  of  similar  significance  might  be  ad- 
duced, but  we  have  in  the  above  sufficient  indications 
of  conditions  which  must  previously  be,  or  such  re- 
sults could  not  be.  Force  is  here,  substantially  in  the 
body  and  executively  going  out  from  the  body,  which 
essentially  is  necessary  in  the  securing  of  these  ends. 
But  mere  force  is  surely  not  all  that  is  here.  There 
is  force  urged  out  and  onward  to  specific  ends,  and 
used  in  different  ways  for  varied  circumstances.  It 
cannot  satisfy  to  assume  that  distinguishable  forces  are 
here  but  mechanically  acting  and  interacting,  and 
mutually  modifying  and  reversing  their  action,  so  reg- 
ularly and  persistently  and  exactly  as  they  do  accord- 
ing to  the  varying  ends  in  the  interest  of  the  organism. 
The  benefit  to  the  organism  is  the  constant  intent,  and 
the  urgency  of  the  secret  energy  is  in  that  direction 


138  CONCRETE    LOGIC. 

unchanged  through  every  other  mutation.  Conditional 
for  such  activity  is  clearly  in  reason's  insight,  the  ne- 
cessity for  force,  and  also  for  some  superinduced  mas- 
tery and  use  of  force,  to  which  its  own  constituted 
mechanism  is  utterly  inadequate. 

And  the  end  proposed  and  attained  fairly  and 
clearly  indicates  what  is  the  character  of  this  super- 
induced master  and  user.  The  force  is  feeling  its 
way  to  a  proposed  end,  which  demands  along  its 
course  assimilations  of  other  forces,  and  modifications 
of  newly  combined  forces,  according  to  widely  diver- 
sified circumstances,  and  it  is  urged  in  its  way  by  the 
feeling,  and  so  the  feeling  must  be  in  the  force,  and 
truly  possess  the  force,  and  use  it  in  the  execution  of 
the  need  which  is  its  own  essence.  The  force  has  the 
feeling  of  a  specific  need,  and  so  becomes  the  execu- 
tive of  a  special  want,  and  is  urged  by  the  want  in 
the  accomplishment  of  the  before-felt  interest.  The 
force  possessed  must  be  the  force  immediately  used, 
but  which  may  mediately  take  hold  on  other  forces, 
and  modify  them  to  the  end  of  its  want,  as  the  want 
modifies  it  in  subserviency  to  its  own  intent.  And  so 
the  feeling  want  must  be  the  prompter  of  the  pos- 
sessed force,  and  can  assimilate  other  forces  to  its  end 
only  by  the  mediation  of  the  forces  it  possesses. 

The  want  may  urge  and  direct  its  possessed 
force  by  turning  an  excess  of  the  component  coun- 
teracting energies  on  either  side,  and  so  guide  to  the 
end  of  the  feeling  need,  and  which,  as  ultimate  end, 
must  be  one,  but  as  subordinate,  may  be  many  and 


ORGANIC  LIFE  AND  ACTIVITY.  139 

successive.  The  instinctive  feeling  may  rise  to  con- 
scious urgency,  as  it  does  in  too  long  suspended 
breathing  ;  or  it  may  ever  prompt  in  unconscious  ur- 
gency, as  in  the  vermicular  motion  of  the  intestines  ; 
but  the  insight  of  reason  sees  alike  in  each  case  that 
the  force  is  controlled  by  the  feeling  that  possesses  it. 
The  force  can  be  figured  in  spacial  limits  and  sub- 
jected to  mathematical  construction,  while  the  feeling 
can  be  recognized  only  in  the  inner  sense  and  the 
analogies  in  conscious  experience,  yet  the  two  in 
union  make  a  middle-third,  indifferently  known  as  a 
feeling  force  or  a  forced  feeling.  All  life-activity  ex- 
presses itself  in  phenomenal  symbols,  that  have  no 
other  meaning  for  the  reason  than  that  of  force  spon- 
taneously working  in  the  end  of  a  specific  want. 
Such  reason-conception  adequately  determines  the 
connections  of  all  organic  facts,  and  identifies  the 
predicates  in  their  subject  for  all  organic  judgments. 
The  end  to  which  the  urgency  is  intent  gives  the 
type  in  constancy  for  every  species,  and  the  stage  in 
consciousness  to  which  it  rises  gives  the  measure  of 
its  reign,  and  in  this  we  have  the  distinctions  of  life 
into  its  various  kingdoms. 

2.  LEADING  ORGANIC  FACTS  IN  THE  VEGETABLE 
KINGDOM.  —  In  mechanics,  the  dominating  Force, 
starting  and  guiding  other  forces,  is  known  as  power  ; 
and  so  in  organic  construction,  the  feeling-force  we 
have  now  attained,  as  urging  on  the  organizing  pro- 
cess by  the  use  of  its  selected  elementary  forces,  may 
be  known  as  distinctively  life-power.  The  directing 


140  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

energy  in  life-power  itself  is  the  feeling  of  need  that 
has  the  force  in  its  possession,  but  feeling  and  force 
in  one  is  the  master-power  amid  nature's  elemental 
forces,  and  which  it  constructs  into  living  bodies.  In 
its  lowest  form,  of  working,  its  dominion  and  rule  is  in 
the  varied  species  of  plant-organization,  and  as  con- 
trolling in  all  vegetation  its  entire  domain  is  known 
as  the  Vegetable  Kingdom.  Keeping  the  conception 
of  Life  which  we  have  attained,  as  a  necessary  condi- 
tion for  the  leading  significant  facts  in  organic  expe- 
rience generally,  viz.,  a  Force  suffused  by  a  feeling 
of  specific  need,  we  now  go  on  to  attain  what  is  fur- 
ther conditional  for  the  life-power  to  be,  and  to  do,  in 
the  rising  reigns  respectively  of  the  three  organic 
kingdoms,  vegetable,  animal,  and  human,  confining 
our  view  here  to  what  is  a  prerequsite  for  the  life- 
power  to  rule  in  the  Vegetable  Kingdom. 

Our  experience  in  Vegetable  Organisms  has  given 
to  us  the  recognition  of  the  following  significant  phe- 
nomena, in  which  the  insight  of  reason  may  read 
much  further  the  precedent  conditions,  which  must 
have  conspired  to  make  such  phenomenal  experience 
possible  to  be  presented  to  our  observation  by  the 
activity  of  the  life-power  in  plant-construction. 

1.  There  is  a  sharp  distinction  between  inorganic 
and  organic  chemical  combinations,  from  binary  com- 
plemental  equivalents  to  ternary  and  quaternary  com- 
binations. In  plant-organisms,  carbon,  oxygen,  hy- 
drogen, and  nitrogen,  in  small  proportion,  are  assimi- 
lated from  their  crude  state  into  living  bodies,  and 


OEGANIC  LIFE  AND   ACTIVITY.  141 

while  supplemented  by  some  other  substances,  these 
alone  are  brought  into  definite  combination. 

2.  They  are  gathered  from  the  soil  by  the  roots, 
and  from  the  atmosphere  by  the  leaves. 

3.  The  vital  sap  is  in  circulation  from  the  roots  to 
the  outermost  buds  and  leaves,  and  then  again  returns 
through  the  stalk  to  the  roots. 

4.  The  organism  has  a  persistent  sympathy  in  every 
part,  and  a  benefit  or  injury  to  any  member  is  felt 
throughout  the  structure. 

5.  The  species  perpetuates  itself  in  numerous  indi- 
viduals.    The  most  simple  multiply  by  sections,  each 
part  restoring  in  itself  the   complete    structure;    a 
higher  grade  produces  spores  or  tubers  from  the  old 
stock  out  of  which  successors  spring ;  while  the  high- 
est plants  propagate  through  sex-generation. 

6.  Ordinarily  generation  is  within  the  sex-distinc- 
tions of  the  same  species,  keeping  the  type  constant 
amid  perpetual  variables,  and   occasionally  varieties 
become  hereditary. 

7.  In  few  cases  nearly  conforming  genera  propa- 
gate hybrids,  which  are  either  sterile  or  tend  back  to 
the  normal  species. 

8.  The  old  stock  provides  for  the  new  plant  in  its 
germination  by  storing  sustenance  in  the  seed,  and 
often  gives  to  the  seed  special  arrangements  for  its  dis- 
tribution, all  kept  constant  according  to  specific  type. 

9.  Plant-life  never  rises  to  consciousness,  and  uses 
its  organisms  only  for  reproduction,  but   not  for  its 
own  gratification,  and  is  destitute  of  loco-motion. 


142  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

10.  The  dissolution  of  the  organism  is  the  destruc- 
tion of  the  plant's  individuality. 

The  primitive  substances  elementary  for  plant- 
formations,  though  composed  of  distinct  forces,  are 
yet  molecules  practically  indissoluble,  and  in  their, 
crude  state  incapable  of  combination  in  cellulose  pro- 
duction except  as  first  assimilated  by  the  life-power. 
•The  end  of  the  life- want  is  just  this  embodiment  of 
itself  in  a  specific  organism,  and  conditional  for  this  is 
its  use  of  its  own  force  in  working  in  and  upon  the 
elementary  molecules  and  modifying  them  to  become 
chemical  equivalents,  thereby  bringing  them  into  cellu- 
lose combination  by  the  special  interposition  of  organic 
chemistry.  The  molecular  forces  so  modified  by  the 
life-power  become  vitally  assimilated  and  enter  the 
organic  structure",  and  for  the  period  fill  their  place 
and  subserve  their  end  in  the  living  body.  In  the 
continued  action  and  reaction  of  accumulating  and 
interchanging  construction,  the  sometime  vitalized 
forces  become  unfitted  for  the  new  occasion,  and  need 
to  be  eliminated  as  now  exhausted  material,  and  be 
better  supplied  by  new  assimilations.  The  organism 
is  thus  matured  and  sustained  by  continual  loss  and 
supply,  and  it  is  conditional  that  the  persistently 
working  life-want  spontaneously  urge  on  this  con- 
tinually selecting  and  assimilating  process  in.  the  ful- 
filment of  its  instinctive  craving.  Nothing  other 
than  a  force  which  feels  its  way  to  the  end  of  its  need 
can  execute  so  complicated  an  intent. 

Inasmuch  as  the  sustenance  so  elaborated  is  to  be 


ORGANIC  LIFE  AND   ACTIVITY.  143 

found  and  taken  from  the  earth  and  air,  it  is  further 
conditional  that  the  roots  be  sent  downward  and  the 
stock  and  branches  upward,  and  the  leaves  be  spread 
abroad  for  the  necessary  inhalation  and  exhalation, 
and  with  such  conditions  the  universal  plant-form  must 
be  a  result  of  root,  stock,  branches,  and  leaves,  the 
general  arrangement  admitting  of  endless  varieties.  In 
all  plants  it  is  conditional  that  the  life-power  send  the 
nourishing  fluid  to  every  part,  but  this  becomes  won- 
drously  conspicuous  in  forcing  the  sap  against  gravity 
to  the  topmost  bud  and  leaf  of  the  tallest  trees.1 

1  President  Clark,  of  Massachusetts  Agricultural  College,  has 
recently  made  carefully  exact  experiments  in  the  circulation  of  sap 
in  trees,  of  a  very  surprising  and  unmistakable  significance.  They 
indicate  other  points  important  for  science  and  philosophy,  but 
especially  in  this  here  considered  —  the  astonishing  degree  of  the 
life-power.  We  make  the  following  very  interesting  and  clearly 
expressed  quotations. 

"  On  the  20th  of  April,  1873,  two  guages  were  attached  to  a  large 
black  birch,  one  at  the  ground  and  the  other  thirty  feet  higher. 
The  next  morning,  at  six  o'clock,  the  lower  gauge  indicated  the 
astonishing  pressure  of  56.65  feet  of  water,  and  the  upper  one  of 
26.74  feet.  The  difference  between  the  indications  of  the  two 
gauges  was  thus  29.92  feet,  while  the  actual  distance  between  them 
was  30.20  feet,  so  that  they  corresponded  almost  precisely  as  if  con- 
nected by  a  tube.  In  order  to  learn  whether  the  same  principle 
would  prevail  if  the  upper  gauge  was  moved,  it  was  raised  twelve 
feet  higher.  The  same  correspondence  continued  through  nearly 
all  the  observations  of  the  season,  notwithstanding  the  gauges  were 
separated  by  42.20  feet  of  close-grained  birch-wood." 

"At  12.  30  P.  M.,  April  21,  a  hole  was  bored  into  the  tree  on  the 
side  opposite  the  lower  gauge,  and  at  the 'same  level.  Both  gauges 
at  once  began  to  show  diminished  pressure,  while  sap  issued  freely 
from  the  orifice.  In  fifteen  minutes,  one  pound  of  sap  having 


144  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

Nothing  can  be  found  supplying  such  persistent  and 
strenuous  energy  but  the  internal  working  of  the  life- 
power  in  the  respective  plant  itself. 

This  pervasion  of  every  part  by  the  perpetual  ac- 
tivity of  the  one  life- want  conditions  the  sympathy 
everywhere  found  in  organic  structures,  making 
every  part  to  feel  an  injury  or  a  benefit  to  any  one 
part.  Neither  the  rootlets  nor  the  leaves  can  be  sev- 
ered from  the  plant  but  though  at  opposite  extrem- 
ities of  the  organism  the  other  immediately  suffers. 
The  life-power  is  the  essence  of  the  structure  and  is 
one  in  every  member,  and  this  feels  the  change  wher- 
ever made. 

The  propagation  of  plants  clearly  indicates  the  dif- 
fusion of  this  controlling  life-power  through  the 

escaped,  it  was  found  that  both  gauges  had  fallen  to  19.27  feet  of 
water.  .Upon  closing  the  hole,  the  gauges  in  ten  minutes  rose  to 
their  previous  level,  showing  that  the  rootlets  had  reabsorbed  in 
that  brief  period  the  sap  which  had  escaped  from  the  tree,  notwith- 
standing the  enormous  pressure  already  existing." 

"A  stop-cock  having  been  inserted  into  the  hole  opposite  the 
lower  gauge,  it  was  found  that  the  communication  between  it  and 
both  the  gauges  was  almost  instantaneous ;  which  shows  that  the 
tree  must  have  been  entirely  filled  with  sap  to  the  height  indicated 
by  the  column  of  mercury  in  the  lower  gauge,  which  exerted  its 
pressure  in  all  directions  as  freely  as  if  standing  in  a  cylindrical 
vessel  as  large  as  the  bark  of  the  trunk.  The  sap-pressure  con- 
tinued to  increase  until,  on  the  4th  of  May,  it  represented  a  column 
of  water  84.77  feet  in  height." 

"  To  determine,  if  possible,  whether  any  other  force  than  the 
vital  action  of  the  roots  was  necessary  to  produce  the  extraordinary 
phenomena  described,  a  gauge  was  attached  to  the  root  of  a  black 
birch-tree  as  follows :  A  root  was  followed  from  the  trunk  to  the 


ORGANIC  LIFE  AND  ACTIVITY. 


organism.  In  the  simplest  constructed  form  there  is. 
needed  nothing  further  than  a  section  from  the  old 
stock,  and  the  almost  homogeneity  of  the  parts  grows 
out  under  the  prompting  instinct  in  full  proportion. 
A  little  higher  order  of  plants  collects  its  assimilated 
cellulose  in  spores  or  tubers  about  the  old  leaves  or 
branches,  and  the  same  life-want  urges  out  a  continu- 
ation of  the  same  constructing  activity  as  that  still 
going  on  in  the  plant,  and  the  new  is  but  the  trans- 
ferred life  of  the  old,  like  another  branch  or  bud  of 
the  same,  though  separated.  The  most  perfect  organ- 
isms have  the  most  complete  sex-distinctions.  The 
fruit-bud  evinces  a  distinctly  conditioning  urgency 
from  the  leaf-bud  at  the  start,  which  has  been  given 
by  the  old  life-power  at  the  fructifying  season,  and 

distance  of  ten  feet,  where  it  was  carefully  cut  off  one  foot  below  the 
surface,  and  a  piece  removed  from  between  the  cut  and  the  tree. 
The  end  of  the  root  thus  entirely  detached  from  the  tree,  and  lying  in  a 
horizontal  position  at  the  depth  of  one  foot  in  the  cold,  damp  earth, 
unreached  by  the  sunshine,  and  for  the  most  part  unaffected  by  the 
temperature  of  the  atmosphere,  measured  about  one  inch  in  diame- 
ter. To  this  was  carefully  adjusted  a  mercurial  gauge,  April  26. 
The  pressure  at  once  became  evident,  and  rose  constantly,  with  very 
slight  fluctuations,  until  at  noon,  on  the  30th  of  April,  it  had  attained 
the  unequalled  height  of  85.80  feet  of  water.  This  wonderful  result 
showed  that  the  absorbing  power  of  living  birch  rootlets,  without  the 
aid  of  any  of  the  numerous  helps  imposed  upon  them  by  ingenious 
philosophers,  such  as  osmose,  exhalation,  dilatation,  contraction, 
oscillation,  capillarity,  &c.,  &c.,  was  quite  sufficient  to  account  for 
the  most  essential  of  the  curious  phenomena  >  connected  with  the 
circulation  of  sap."  —  Lecture  on  the  Circulation  of  Sap  in  Plants, 
by  President  W.  S.  Clark.  Wright  &  Potter,  Publishers,  Boston. 

10 


146  CONCKETE  LOGIC. 

the  two  corresponding  genders  appear  usually  in  the 
same  calyx,  though  sometimes  apart  on  the  same  or  on 
a  different  stalk,  and  together  engender  a  newly  con- 
structed embryo.  The  preserved  proportion  of  num- 
bers in  the  sexes,  the  perpetuation  of  the  specific 
type  in  the  new  seed,  and  the  sterility,  or  returning 
likeness  to  the  ancestral  stock  of  an  occasional  hybrid 
generation,  all  betoken  that  an  original  typical  want 
.has  continued  its  urgency  down  through  the  individ- 
uals of  the  species.  The  typical  want  has  been  a  con- 
stant, and  perpetually  passing  moods  have  been  vari- 
ables, but  the  varieties,  though  strong  enough  to  be- 
come in  some  cases  hereditary,  still  keep  their  restric- 
tion within  the  specific  type-want.  The  perpetuation 
of  the  species  through  long  lines  of  individual  gener- 
ation bespeak  to  the  reason  an  intelligible  meaning, 
that  a  primitive  feeling  of  a  specific  need  has  urged 
its  way  down  the  generations ;  and  then,  again,  that 
the  classified  genera  conspire  from  the  lower  to  unite 
in  one  highest  and  maturest  model,  means,  as  unmis- 
takably, that  all  species  are  conditioned  to  an  original 
Ideal. 

The  plant-want  terminates  in  organic  construction 
and  reproduction,  and  feels  no  intent  on  any  use  of 
the  organism  for  self-gratification.  The  feeling  is 
solely  a  craving  or  longing  for  what  is  not  yet,  and 
never  waking  to  what  is,  nor  recurring  to  what  has 
been,  and  is  necessitated  to  act  in  unconsciousness  as 
an  instinct,  and  never  to  open  in  enjoyment,  or  be 
satisfied  by  possession.  It  toils  spontaneously  in  and 


ORGANIC   LIFE  AND   ACTIVITY.  147 

for  its  organism  that  others  will  use  and  enjoy,  and 
when  that  organism  perishes,  the  living  individualism 
of  the  plant  is  lost. 

3.  LEADING  ORGANIC  FACTS  IN  THE  ANIMAL 
KINGDOM.  —  The  facts  already  no£ed  in  the  instinc- 
tive construction  and  continuation  of  plant-organisms 
will  also  appear  in  their  peculiar  modes  in  the  obser- 
vation of  animal  life,  and  it  is  not  needed  that  what 
is  common  to  each  should  be  further  considered. 
The  facts  peculiar  to  animal  life,  and  which  are  signifi- 
cantly distinctive  of  the  prerequisite  conditions,  need 
here  alone  to  engage  our  attention.  The  life-power 
rules  here  in  a  superior  kingdom,  and  there  are  clear 
facts  indicative  of  what  was  primitively  necessary  in 
order  to  the  attainment  of  this  superior  realm,  and  the 
more  prominent  of  these  will  satisfy  the  present  design. 

1.  The  essential  elevation  of  animal  above  vege- 
table   construction  and  growth,  is  in  the    capability 
to  sensation  and  conscious  perception  which  animal 
life-power  exhibits,  and  which  is  secured  through  the 
medium  of  the  special  senses  that  make  the  body  to  be 
an  organism  of  several  organs  in  unity. 

2.  These  special  senses  are  made  effective  by  their 
connection  with  a  nervous  arrangement,  which  is  a 
system   of  irritable   fibres   connecting   in    numerous 
central  ganglions,  and  in   the  higher  orders  of  ani- 
mals have  their  source  in  the  brain  and  spinal-cord. 
These   nerve-fibres   communicate   from   without   the 
organism,  and  are  known  as  afferent,  and  others  com- 
municate only  internally,  and  are  known  as  efferent. 


148  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

3.  The  animal  organism  is  constructed  from  cellu- 
lose  substances   previously  assimilated   in   vegetable 
life,  or  from  other  animal  flesh,  and  except  in  the  ad- 
dition of  more  nitrogen,  takes  nothing  direct  from  the 
mineral  kingdom  in  definite  combinations. 

4.  The  arrangements  for  digestion  and  assimilation 
are  within  the  body,  which  has  also  provisional  mem- 
bers for  loco-motion  and  other  subservient  uses. 

5.  The  sense  organs  open  the  most  favorably  for 
impressions  from  the  outer  world. 

6.  The  general  form  of  head,  body,  and  limbs,  on 
each  side  in  pairs,  is  most  accommodating  for  the  ani- 
mal conveniences  and  uses. 

7.  The   animal-sense   rises   to    consciousness,    and 
urges  to  action  through  appetite,  so  that  while  in- 
stinctive  action  is  from  want,  sentient  action  is  for 
gratification. 

8.  Animal  intelligence  is  perception  and  judgment, 
according  to  sense-experience. 

9.  The  animal  has  conscious  individuality,  but  the 
animal  self  is  strictly  bound  in  the  necessities  of  na- 
ture. 

10.  The  dissolution  of  the  body  is  the  loss  of  sen- 
sation, and  self-individuality  perishes  in  it. 

By  applying  the  insight  of  reason  to  these  empiri- 
cal phenomena,  we  shall  read  therein  the  prerequisite 
conditions  which  make  them  possible. 

There  must  be  such  a  construction  and  arrange- 
ment of  the  organism  as  shall  subserve  the  end  of 
sensation.  A  sentient  embodiment,  and  conscious 


ORGANIC  LIFE  AND   ACTIVITY.  149 

experience  in  it,  are  to  be  utterly  new  originations,  to 
which  the  whole  vegetable  kingdom  is  an  entire 
stranger.  The  conscious  activity  is  to  be  under  the 
prompting  and  guiding  urgency  of  appetite,  and  the 
whole  organism  must  be  subservient  to  it.  The  spe- 
cial senses  must  be  accommodatingly  set  in  the  most 
convenient  and  servicable  positions,  arrangements  for 
moving  members,  and  the  loco-motion  of  the  entire 
body,  in  ministration  to  sense-gratifying,  must  be  se- 
cured, and  such  gratification  is  to  be  connected  with, 
and  auxiliary  to  the  nourishment  and  preservation  and 
reproduction  of  the  organism,  so  that  the  welfare  of 
the  body  and  the  indulgence  of  the  appetites  may  go 
on  concordant  together.  The  digestive  arrangement 
must  be  within,  and  borne  about  by  the  organism,  that 
persistent  assimilations  may  be  continued  while  move- 
ment from  place  to  place  occurs.  The  plant  may  find 
its  end  in  its  fixed  position,  the  animal  can  gratify 
sense  only  in  motion.  And  as  bare  mechanical  force 
had  the  prerequisite  that  it  become  possessed  by  a 
feeling  need  for  an  organism  in  which  to  work  and 
reproduce  its  kind,  so  the  simple  plant-life  must  have 
superinduced  upon  it  the  feeling  of  a  higher  need, 
in  order  to  an  organism  by  which  sensation  shall  be 
reached,  and  in  which  the  sensation  shall  wake  to  con- 
scious gratification. 

Both  plant  and  animal  bodies  have  their  construc- 
tion alike  by  an  activity  wholly  below  consciousness, 
but  by  as  much  as  the  sentient  organism  transcends 
the  plant-construction,  so  much  must  the  animal  life- 


150  COXCKETE  LOGIC. 

power  rise  above  plant-instinct.  The  added  force  of 
nitrogen  is  taken,  and  quaternary  combination  is  ef- 
fected, and  wholly  new  ends  are  to  be  attained,  and  a 
new  sovereign  must  commence  another  reign  in  a  sepa- 
rate and  higher  kingdom.  Beyond  vegetable  pulp  and 
ligneous  fibre  there  is  to  be  animal  bone  and  muscle, 
and  much  more  significant  than  either,  there  must  be 
the  irritable  nerve-system,  with  the  ganglionic  centres 
reciprocating  the  afferent  and  efferent  communicating 
fibres.  A  want  that  covers  all  this  must  possess  a 
force  efficient  to  get  all  this,  and  as  an  instinctive 
builder  of  the  body,  this  is  subsequently  to  be- 
come its  conscious  possessor  and  gratified  user.  As 
instinctive  agent,  the  life-want  in  plant  and  animal 
alike  thrusts  the  possessed  force  through  to  the  end 
of  the  need  felt,  only  in  the  animal  the  need  reaches 
further,  and  the  feeling  covers  more,  than  in  plant- 
construction,  but  in  both  the  want  is  intent  only  on  its 
end,  and  urges  its  way  to  it  with  no  present  or  retro- 
spective notice  of  its  own  activity.  Even  when  the 
animal  organism  is  completed  there  is  much  instinc- 
tive use  made  of  it.  Digestion  and  circulation  and 
secretion  go  on  in  unconsciousness,  and  sensation  it- 
self is  brought  to  conscious  perception  by  a  previous 
action  spontaneously  distinguishing  and  defining  the 
organic  impressions.  But  when  the  conscious  percep- 
tion ensues,  then  in  it  animal  experience  begins.  The 
life-power  comes  to  reciprocal  activity  in  the  nerve 
centres,  and  a  common  central  sensory  co-ordinates 
the  whole,  and  the  conscious  perception  is  retained  in 


ORGANIC  LIFE  AND  ACTIVITY.  151 

memory,  and  association  and  comparison  and  abstrac- 
tion begin,  and  judgments  are  formed,  and  deduced 
conclusions  made,  according  to  observed  order  in  ex- 
perience, and  the  animal  learns  as  practice  progresses. 
He  has  found  a  sense-world  in  which  he  intelligently 
lives  and  moves,  recognizes  its  objects  and  their  qual- 
ities, executes  brute-will  in  gratifying  appetite,  and 
acquires  prudential  economy  in  attaining  happiness  as 
his  ultimate  end. 

All  is  conditioned  in  the  nervous  organism  the  life- 
power  has  constructed,  and  in  which  it  attains  con- 
scious individuality,  and  the  individual  animal  con- 
tinues while  the  living  organism  endures  and  the 
life-power  works  consciously  within  it ;  but  when  the 
organism  is  dissolved,  all  capacity  for  sensation  and 
conscious  recognition  and  appetitive  gratification  is 
lost,  and  the  individual  animal  is  no  more.  Through 
sex-distinctions  new  embryos  have  been  generated, 
and  individual  descendants  begotten  ;  but  these  have 
waked  in  consciousness  within  their  respective  organ- 
isms, and  are  distinct  individuals  in  their  distinct 
bodies,  and  can  have  and  retain  consciousness  only  in 
and  by  them.  The  unity  of  species,  as  in  plants,  is 
perpetuated  in  the  offspring  by  becoming  prolific  only 
through  concordant  genders,  and  so  the  species  en- 
dures, while  the  individuals  of  successive  generations 
perish  without  a  resurrection. 

4.  LEADING    ORGANIC    FACTS  IN  THE    HUMAN" 
FAMILY.  —  In  instinctive  construction,  plant,  animal, 
and  man  are  alike  produced  in  unconsciousness,  and 


152  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

in  sensation  and  sense-cognition  animal  and  man  are 
the  same  essentially,  the  grand  distinction  from  all 
other  beings  which  come  within  conscious  experience 
is,  that  in. man  alone  is  found  self-activity  in  conscious 
liberty  of  will,  and  from  this,  and  in  order  to  this, 
many  other  exclusive  peculiarities  are  found  in  hu- 
manity. It  is  only  of  these  exclusively  distinctive 
human  facts  that  we  need  take  any  notice,  and  only 
such  of  these  as  most  strikingly  signify  the  precedent 
conditions  which  alone  could  make  their  admission 
into  conscious  experience  possible  for  us. 

1.  Man  only  is  fitted  for  loco-motion  in  an  erect 
position,   with  the  instrumentality  of  two  complete 
arms  and  hands,  organs  of  speech,  and  the  majestic 
expression  of  an  open  brow. 

2.  The  human  body  is  the  full  pattern  after  which 
all  lower  organisms  are  in  their  respective  grades  suc- 
cessively aspiring,  and  in  this  all  organic  morphology 
comes  to  perfection. 

3.  Man   only  lives   in   family   relations,  regulated 
social  communities,  and  under  state  authority. 

4.  Man  separates  himself,  and  that  which  is  his, 
from  all  else,  and  knows  himself  in  distinct  person- 
ality, and  in  his  rights  of  possession  and  property. 

5.  Man  only  lives  in  an  experience  where  thought 
and  sentiment  are  communicated  through  expressive 
symbols. 

6.  Mankind  alone  experience  the  admiration  of  the 
Beautiful,  or  can  find  it  as  an  absolute  authority  and 
ultimate  standard  in  all  questions  of  taste  in  Art. 


-u) 


ORGANIC  LIFE  AND  ACTIVITY.  153 

7.  Mankind  alone  can  carry  science  up  to  philoso- 
phy, and  apply  a  determinative  and  universal  standard 
of  Truth. 

8.  Man  alone,  of  all  sentient  beings,  is  capable  of  - 
knowing  and  following  an  Ultimate  Rule  of  ..Morals. 

9.  Man  alone  can  worship,  and  propose  to  himself 
a  Being  for  his  supreme  reverence. 

10.  Only  man  forecasts  his  Immortality,  and  antici>/ 
pates  a  future  reckoning  and  reward  according   to 
moral  character. 

In  these  facts  we  can  read  many  plain  and  impor-  . 
tant  lessons  of  what  must  have  conditioned  them. 

Necessarily  conditional  for  the  human  organism  is 
the  feeling  of  need,  which  as  a  want  is  instinctively 
working  to  another  end  than  mere  plant-embodiment, 
-  or  even  of  animal  cognition  and  gratification.  It  is 
"^  the  crowning  completeness  and  perfection  of  all  liv- 
ing forms,  and  the  instinct  that  builds  and  uses  it 
must  be  as  much  higher  and  nobler  than  plant  or  ani- 
mal instinct,  as  is  the  end  to  be  attained  in  it  higher 
and  nobler  than  theirs.  Animal  sense,  with  no  higher 
endowment,  could  not  use  the  human  body  in  its 
skilful  dexterity,  and  powers  of  speech,  and  diffused 
dignity  of  feature  ;  and  even  less  capable  would  ani- 
mal instinct  be  to  build  a  body  it  did  not  want  and 
could  not  use.  Except  as  the  life-power  be  also  im-  ' 
bued  with  the  spontaneous  urgency  of  the  reason,  the 
human  fashion  can  never  take  to  itself  the  divine 
image.  Reason  must  prompt  in  the  making,  and 
guide  in  the  using,  of  the  organism,  just  as  reason 


154  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

only  can  read  in  it  the  mysterious  meaning  expressed 
by  it,  and  the  final  purpose  for  it.  The  man's  essential 
rationality  is  a  superinduction  upon  vegetable  and 
sentient  life,  and  can  be  no  development  from  plant 
or  animal. 

Plant-instinct  makes  its  own  body,  and  then  works 
in  it  to  perpetuate  it,  and  reproduce  others  of  its 
species  from  it;  animal  instinct,  also,  constructs  its 
body  with  irritable  sentient  nerves,  and  instinct  also 
distinguishes  and  defines  the  primitive  sense-affec- 
tions ;  man  also,  so  far  as  vital  and  sentient  only,  has 
his  body  instinctively  made,  and  at  first  instinctively 
used  in  its  conscious  up-waking  ;  but  beyond  all  this, 
for  man  there  are  other  and  higher  instincts,  to  which 
all  brute-life  is  an  utter  stranger.  The  parent  brute 
has  notes  of  encouragement  and  warning  instinctively 
stimulating  its  young  through  desire  or  fear,  and  the 
human  parent  does  the  same  for  the  child ;  but  how 
much  further  do  the  human  instincts  reach,  and  how 
different  are  they,  when  the  child  begins  to  catch  the 
meaning  of  the  mother's  look,  or  soothing  song,  or 
stern  command,  or  her  gentle,  serious  folding  of  the 
infant  hands  for  prayer !  No  brute-instinct  in  either 
parent  or  offspring  ever  urged  the  living  activity  in  such 
directions.  Only  as  deeper  wants  are  hidden  in  the  hu- 
man life  could  the  child's  instinct  open  to  such  mean- 
ings, or  the  parent's  heart  yearn  to  quicken  in  the  in- 
fant these  peculiar  and  exclusively  human  impulses. 

And  so,  moreover,  when  sense-appetite  is  con- 
sciously awakened,  and  clamors  for  gratification,  the 


ORGANIC  LIFE   AND  ACTIVITY.  155 

mere  animal  has  no  counter-check  to  the  urgency  of 
desire,  and  can  have  only  one  variety  of  brute-passion 
set  in  restraint  over  against  another,  and  so  of  neces- 
sity must  go  in  the  way  of  the  strongest  interest  for 
happiness ;  yet  is  the  man  conscious  of  quite  another 
urgency  than  appetite,  and  that  he  can  set  an  impera- 
tive over  against  it  which  will  admit  of  no  comparison 
of  interests  in  happiness  with  it,  and  thereby  can  hold 
his  sense  subordinate  to  the  claims  of  his  rational 
spirit,  and  live  for  worthiness  of  moral  character,  and 
not  in  the  end  of  any  gratification.  He  knows  "  a  law 
in  the  mind"  sovereign  in  authority  over  any  appe- 
tite as  "  a  law  in  the  members,"  and  that  in  this  he 
can  "free  himself  from  the  law  of  sin  and  death." 
Conditional  for  this  is  the  endowment  of  reason,  which 
knows  its  own  intrinsic  dignity  and  excellence,  and  so 
is  a  law  to  itself  in  its  own  claims,  and  above  which 
no  passion  may  exalt  itself  without  conscious  debase- 
ment and  shame  in  the  spirit  permitting  it.  The 
man's  birthright  is  in  his  reason,  and  he  must  sell  it 
for  nothing. 

This  capabilit}7-  of  interposing  a  counter-check  to 
any  urgent  appetite  by  a  claim  in  the  interest  of 
reason,  and  thus  possessing  self-mastery  and  conscious 
liberty,  is  witnessed  in  divers  modes  of  man's  ac- 
tive experience.  Were  nothing  but  brute-appetites 
urging,  the  stronger  must  prevail,  and  the  executive 
act  go  out  after  it ;  and  to  the  excess  of  one  above 
another  there  can  be  nothing  to  restrain  it,  and  sense 
is  left  with  no  alternative.  But  just  here  the  man 


156  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

can,  as  the  brute  cannot,  interpose  the  beautiful  in 
art,  and  hold  sense  in  check  by  an  ultimate  standard 
of  taste ;  or  introduce  scientific  truth,  and  hold  appe- 
tite subordinate  to  the  claims  of  philosophy ;  or  hold 
on  to  an  ultimate  right,  and  refuse  any  gratification  in 
conflict  with  morality ;  or,  above  all,  may  interpose  a 
religious  claim,  by  saying,  "  How  can  I  do  this  great 
wickedness,  and  sin  against  God?"  Conditional  for 
this  free  will  in  liberty  is  the  endowment  of  reason 
which  urges  to  action  only  for  its  approbation,  and 
for  which  the  man  is  consciously  competent  to  deny 
any  possible  gratification.  He  may  deny  appetite,  for 
his  dignity's  sake,  in  either  taste,  or  science,  or  mo- 
rality, or  piety. 

These  leading  facts  in  human  life  and  experience, 
that  a  nobler  organism  is  instinctively  constructed  for 
man  than  that  of  brute  embodiment,  that  his  earliest 
instinctive  impulses  are  superior  to  any  sense-urgency, 
and  that  he  can  practically  control  his  appetites,  by 
an  ultimate  standard  of  beauty,  truth,  and  goodness, 
all  necessitate  a  previous  superinduction  of  reason 
upon  sensational  life-power ;  and  to  these-  we  only 
add,  that  man's  expectation  of  immortality  is  valid 
only  on  this  his  endowment  of  reason.  Animal  and 
human  instinct  alike  reluctate  disorganization  and 
death.  But  more  than  this  is  needed  to  make  man 
sure  of  existence  after  death.  His  rationality  has 
given  him  personality  and  responsibility,  and  induced 
a  permanent  character  in  the  disposition  taken  that 
will  not  admit  of  annihilation,  but  must  have  persis- 


ORGANIC   LIFE  AND   ACTIVITY.  157 

tent  living  retribution.  Sentient  soul  has  been  joined 
in  this  disposing  with  rational  spirit ;  and  though  death 
may  sunder  soul  and  spirit,  yet  the  equitable  claim  on 
both  must  bring  them  again  together  with  no  subse- 
quent divorcement.  So  much  of  the  substantial 
organism  as  shall  hold  soul  and  spirit,  sense  and 
reason,  in  one  embodiment,  must  stand  up  again  in 
endless  retributive  consciousness.  Man's  immortality 
rests  alone  in  its  reasonableness. 

This  will  suffice  as  an  outline  of  logic  for  organic 
being,  concrete  and  integrant ;  and  of  the  whole  there 
is  the  conspiring  validity  from  the  three  sources  of 
prerequisite  conditions — reason  directly  affirming  that, 
except  on  the  conditions  specified,  the  empirical  phe- 
nomena cannot  be  ;  that  with  such  conditions  the 
phenomena  must  so  be ;  and  that  these  conditions  so 
exactly  attain  the  end  as  to  evince  that  this  was  their 
final  purpose.  But  a  short  word  further  is  needful 
in  reference  to  the  connection  of  organic  with  inor- 
ganic being,  whereby  of  the  two  there  is  made  literally 
a  universe. 

Life  is  the  source  of  organic  being ;  and  this  has 
been  found  to  be  force  suffused  by  a  feeling  urging  to 
a  special  end.  Of  all  inorganic  being  force  is  the  sub- 
stance —  antagonist  force  for  material  being,  and  di- 
remptive  force  for  ethereal  being ;  and  so  the  com- 
mon base  of  both  is  the  same  mechanical  existence, 
and  which  works  under  mechanical  law  for  inorganic 
bodies,  and  according  to  the  specific  living  law  in  the 
peculiar  spontaneities  of  the  respective  kingdoms  of 


158  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

vegetable,  animal,  and  human  organisms  ;  the  organic 
feeling  using  the  mechanical  forces  for  its  own  ends. 
In  the  nature  of  the  case,  reason  determines  that  the 
diremptive  force  is  more  immediately  appropriate  for 
the  possession  and  use  of  the  life-want  than  the  antag- 
onist energies,  inasmuch  as  thereby  the  requisite  solu- 
tions and  modifying  conversions  of  material  substances 
in  assimilation  with  the  living  process  may  be  the 
more  readily  accomplished.  The  expulsive  force 
works  in  and  through  material  combinations,  while  an 
impulsive  energy  can  only  work  upon  them.  Both 
in  plant  and  animal  life,  the  elaboration  of  elementary 
substances,  and  their  movement  in  organic  construc- 
tions, indicate  divellent  action  from  centres  rather 
than  compressive  action  to  central  points,  especially 
in  all  agencies  of  light,  and  applications  of  vital-heat 
to  organic  growth,  and  circulation  of  sap  or  blood 
through  the  bodily  structure.  But  quite  beyond  this 
indication  from  inherent  fitness  and  observed  vital 
movement  of  circulating  fluids,  there  is  the  oppor- 
tunity for  direct  experimental  confirmation  of  the 
fact  that  the  intermediate  force  in  the  life-activity  is 
the  ethereal,  and  through  this  it  works  on  and  in  the 
material.  Brutes  and  men  have  power  over  their 
bodies  and  limbs ;  and  though  the  force  itself  cannot 
be  perceived,  our  conscious  method  of  use  proves  it  to 
be  diremptive  energy. 

Material  bodies  are  moved  by  the  muscular  matter 
of  our  bodily  organism,  pulling  to  or  pushing  from 
itself ;  but  one  can  do  neither  without  foothold,  and 


OKGANIC  LIFE  AND   ACTIVITY.  159 

whichsoever  it  may  be,  the  difference  will  be  only 
that  of  direction  from  the  foot-fulcrum,  since  at  that 
point  the  one  agency  is  consciously  expulsive.  We 
effect  no  outer  movement  but  by  an  inner  expulse, 
parting  or  separating  external  objects  by  an  internal 
diremption.  We  overcome  rest,  and  check  onward 
motion,  by  a  counter-energizing  each  way  from  a  mid- 
point. As  our  own  conscious  direction  of  inner  ener- 
gizing is  expulsive  and  diremptive,  so  we  may  also  see 
all  living  action  to  be  in  the  use  of  diremptive  forces, 
and  as  truly  expulsive  from  a  common  point  in  vege- 
table growth  and  movement  as  in  animal  effort  and 
locomotion.  The  plant  elongates  itself  towards  the 
light,  or  in  the  way  to  its  more  congenial  or  abun- 
dant nutriment,  by  an  urgency  strenuously  working 
in  expulsive  energies  ;  and  all  vegetable  growth  is  the 
result  of  intense  inner  expansion,  as  in  the  cases 
noticed  above  of  strong  animal  exertion.  Both  plants 
and  animals  use  diremptively  the  forces  the  life-want 
possesses,  and  to  very  large  degrees,  but  can  directly 
control  only  each  its  own  energies.1 

The  spontaneity  of  living  motive  is  want  in  the 

1  The  amount  of  expansive  force  in  vegetable  growth  would  be 
utterly  incredible  but  as  stated  from  careful  experiment.  President 
Clark,  since  attaining  the  facts  in  sap-circulation,  which  we  have 
before  noted,  has  been  diligently  extending  his  ingenious  re- 
searches. This  present  season  (1874)  he  planted  a  seed  of  mammoth 
squash  in  prepared  soil,  under  the  glass  roof  of  his  green-house,  and 
made  the  vine  run  along  upon  a  strong  table.  The  first  set  squash, 
the  1st  of  August,  was  left  to  grow  to  about  four  inches  diameter, 
and  was  then  covered  as  it  lay  solid  on  the  table  with  a  basket-work 


160  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

plant  and  sense-appetite  in  the  brute,  and  in  both 
it  is  only  as  inne.r  nature  and  outer  conditions  prompt 
the  life-power.  Both  can  take  to  themselves  that 
which  is  craved,  the  one  instinctively,  the  other  con- 
sciously ;  but  in  neither  plant  nor  brute-life  can  there 
be  anything  beyond  selection,  and  never  a  proper  elec- 
tion. What  they  take  to  themselves  is  never  with  the 
alternative  of  a  choice,  but  with  an  urgency  in  one 
direction.  Instinct  and  conscious  appetite  are  fated  to 
the  way  of  the  stronger  urgency.  Man  also,  as  ani- 
mal, is  bound  to  the  end  of  highest  happiness  only ; 
but  as  endowed  with  reason,  man  can  subordinate 
sense,  and  hold  any  gratification  in  check  which  has 
not  rational  approbation.  Man  is  the  creature  of 
liberty,  and  can  act  on  nature  from  supernatural  mo- 
tives. He,  like  all  living  agents,  can  move  nature 
only  through  diremptive  energies  ;  but  he  can  origi- 
nate a  persistent  disposition  in  the  spirit  that  may 
control  any  urgency  of  sense. 

Thus,  in  all  cases,  the  organic  is  in  direct  connection 
with  the  inorganic  world  through  their  reciprocation 
of  their  respective  forces.  By  the  use  of  possessed 

of  iron  slips,  having  the  checkered  spaces  about  two  inches  square, 
and  an  iron  fulcrum  with  a  thin  edge  raised  upon  and  across  the 
basket-cover  on  the  squash.  On  this  fulcrum-edge  was  laid  a  strong 
bar,  one  end  linked  to  the  table  about  one  foot  on  one  side,  and  the 
other  end  free,  about  six  feet  on  the  other  side  from  the  fulcrum, 
with  the  squash  growing  up  beneath.  A  perpendicular  graded  scale 
determined  the  elevations  of  the  longer  arm  out  of  a  horizontal  po- 
sition, and  on  this  arm  were  suspended  successively  augmented 
weights,  as  the  growing  squash  increased  its  lifting  power.  From 


OKGANIC  LITE  A>TD  ACTIVITY.  161 

diremptive  force  life  modifies  matter,  and  builds  up  its 
organism  of  assimilated  forces  always  instinctively,  and 
in  the  constructed  organism,  man  and  brute,  as  animal, 
move  matter  for  the  sake  of  appetitive  gratification, 
while  man  alone,  as  reason  governs  appetite,  and  can 
move  the  material  world  in  the  rational  interests  of 
beauty,  truth,  and  goodness.  Our  world  is  held  in 
connection  with  all  worlds  by  interacting  forces,  and 
all  living  beings  of  our  world  have  thus  their  connec- 
tion with  all  material  worlds  by  mechanical  laws. 
Such  as  are  merely  instinctive  or  appetitive  agencies 
can  never  transcend  these  laws.  But  beyond  all  me- 
chanical law  man  is  supernaturally  endowed,  and 
while  bound  in  and  to  matter,  and  competent  to  in- 
habit a  material  universe,  he  is  also  competent  to  com- 
mune with  an  Intelligence  that  gives  law  to  matter, 
and  as  absolute  reason  is  absolute  law  to  himself. 

fifty  pounds  at  first,  the  augmented  weights  raised  by  the  vegetable 
growth  (the  expansions  always  at  night,  and  nearly  stationary  by 
day)  have  gone  up  to  the  astonishing  amount  of  two  thousand  pounds 
avoirdupois  at  this  present  writing  (October  5)  ;  and  this  lift  of  a  full 
ton  still  seems  quite  within  the  ne  plus  of  its  future  capability.  The 
surface  bulges  through  the  meshes  of  the  iron  basket,  and  the  whole 
vegetable  is  crowded  by  its  frame  into  a  cylindrical  form  above  the 
table,  having  now  its  transverse  diameters  about  fifteen  inches  each. 
11 


1G2  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 


III. 

ABSOLUTE    BEING  ABOVE  ALL  FINITE  EXPE- 
RIENCES. 

GRADES  or  EXPERIENCE.  —  We  have  before  no- 
ticed the  distinction  in  experience  as  that  of  phenom- 
enal perception  in  consciousness,  and  that  of  rational 
insight  in  a  higher  consciousness  ;  but  we  are  now  in 
position  to  discriminate  all  grades  of  experience  ;  and 
inasmuch  as  we  are  about  to  advance  our  Logic  to  a 
valid  knowing  of  truth  beyond  all  finite  experience, 
it  will  be  found  important  exactly  to  apprehend  all 
^.clearly  distinct  varieties  of  experience. 

Experience  is  ever  a  form  of  knowing,  and  involves 

an  actual  trial  of  the  knowledge  in  consciousness,  and 

.so,  literally,  experience  is  knowing  by  conscious  trial. 

3n  its  lowest  stage,  mere  mental  phantoms  may  be 

vtaken  as  experience,  as  children  live  mostly  in  their 

ifancies,  or  as  a  brain-fever  induces   fancied  appear- 

.ances,  and  dreams  and  even  waking  musings  have  any 

amount  and  variety  of  empty  appearance  ;  and  yet,  as 

the  phantasms  are  mere  appearances  in  consciousness, 

we  speak  of  them  as  illusive  or  deceptive  experience. 

So,  with  careful  intent,  we  mentally  construct  pure 


ABSOLUTE  BEING  ABOVE  EXPERIENCE.          1G3 

figures  in  subjective  consciousness,  and  arrange  them 
in  order  to  some  designed  end,  as  in  geometry  ;  or,  in 
pure  thought,  we  form  conceptions  and  connect  them 
in  judgments  fictitiously,  and  invent  works  of  imagi- 
nation ;  and  all  such  activity  in  conscious  trial  we  may 
define  as  purely  mental  experience.  Impressions 
made  on  the  special  senses,  and  intellectually  distin- 
guished and  defined  in  perception  as  objects  con- 
sciously appearing,  is  the  form  of  knowing  to  which 
the  term  experience  most  commonty  applies,  and 
which  may  be  known  as  phenomenal  experience. 
Conduct  controlled  only  by  such  habitual  experience 
is  empiricism,  as  applied  disparagingly ;  and  where  the 
observation  is  repeated  and  carefully  applied,  we  name 
it  experiment,  by  eminence,  as  scientific  experiment. 

But  beyond  all  sense-experience,  or  any  formal  con- 
ceptions abstracted,  or  any  general  judgments  con- 
cluded from  it,  we  have  a  higher  form  of  knowing 
by  the  insight  of  reason,  and  thereby  attaining  truth 
in  a  transcendental  consciousness,  which  is  the  essen- 
tial determiner  of  the  validity  of  all  knowledge  in 
phenomenal  consciousness.  The  transcendental  is 
seen  to  be  a  prerequisite  condition  for  the  phenome- 
nal, and  much  more  than  any  abstraction  or  deduction 
from  the  phenomenal,  for  the  transcendental  was 
itself  necessary  beforehand  in  order  to  the  possibility 
of  the  phenomenal.  The  reason  sees  in  the  phenome- 
nal facts  that  they  could  not  so  have  been  unless  the 
transcendental  truth  already  had  been.  The  latter  is 
the  essence  of  which  the  former  is  the  appearance, 


164  CONCEETE  LOGIC. 

and  this  latter  is  tried  in  the  reason-consciousness  as 
clearly  and  validly  as  the  former  is  in  the  sense-con- 
sciousness. The  reason-knowing  is  wholly  supersen- 
sual,  and  is  the  most  thorough  and  comprehensive  ; 
and  as  experience  in  its  highest  stage,  it  is  known  as 
philosophical  experience.  Knowledge,  thus  consciously 
tried  in  the  reason,  becomes  settled,  unshaken  convic- 
tion ;  and  no  phenomenal  knowledge  can  give  ulti- 
mate satisfaction  and  security  till  brought  by  the 
reason-insight  to  a  trial  in  the  higher  consciousness. 

And  just  this  is  the  point  to  which  we  have  now 
brought  our  Rational  Logic.  We  know  Force  as  the 
ultimate  essence  for  all  inorganic  phenomena,  and 
Life  as  ultimate  essence  in  organic  appearance,  and 
the  speculative  process  to  such  knowledge  is  philo- 
sophical experience.  We  come  to  know  the  universe 
as  it  is,  and  thus  know  its  very  appearing. 

Here  is  the  highest  point  to  which  our  human  ex- 
perience can  ascend.  We  can  try  nothing  on,  and 
test  nothing  in  and  by,  any  consciousness  beyond  this. 
And  yet  in  our  finite  reason-consciousness,  we  can 
take  these  transcendental  facts  of  Force  and  Life,  and 
subject  them  to  further  insight,  and  can  thereby  truly 
reach  a  higher  knowing  in  their  meaning.  We  can 
in  our  finite  reason  see  what  is  prerequisitely  condi- 
tional for  Force  and  Life  to  be,  just  as  an  insight  into 
phenomenal  facts  gave  the  knowledge  that  conditional 
for  them  force  and  life  must  precede  them.  We  shall 
then  have  the  known  essential  force  and  life  as  validly 
at  least  as  in  sense-consciousness  we  had  their  phenom- 


ABSOLUTE  BEING  ABOVE  EXPERIENCE.    165 

ena,  and  they  are  facts,  things  made,  as  literally  as 
sense-appearances  in  perception  are  made.  And  since 
reason  has  them  beneath  its  gaze  in  its  own  conscious- 
ness, it  is  quite  competent  for  it  to  see  in  them  what 
has  been  necessarily  conditional  for  them.  These 
transcendental  facts  of  force  and  life  which  the  in- 
sight has  read  as  the  meaning  in  their  phenomena, 
the  finite  rational  being  himself  was  in  his  personal 
individuality,  and  thus  in  himself  were  both  material 
force  and  conscious  life  in  tried  experience  ;  but  now, 
in  man's  insight  of  force  and  life,  and  thereby  an  at- 
tained knowledge  of  their  prerequisites,  these  last 
truths,  conditional  for  force  and  life,  must  stand  out 
quite  beyond  all  human  consciousness,  and  can  never 
be  tried-on  by  any  finite  experience.  They  are  the 
ultimate  conditions  for  any  and  for  all  facts,  and 
must  stand  valid  in  their  own  immovable  necessity 
•of  being.  Force  and  life  are  the  substance  and 
essence  of  the  universe,  and  as  these  persist  per- 
petually, they  perpetually  reveal  their  prerequisitions 
as  a  continual  meaning  in  them  and  communicated  by 
them.  We  know  these  prerequisite  conditions  for 
the  universal  force  and  life  to  be  necessarily  in  real 
being,  though  we  can  never  try  them  on  in  our  con- 
scious experience.  Substantial  force  and  essential 
life  we  ourselves  are,  but  their  prerequisites  we 
experimentally  cannot  be.  And  yet  in  our  human  life 
and  experience  we  have  the  endowment  of  reason, 
which  imperatively  controls  and  uses  the  mechanical 
force  and  sentient  life  within  us,  and  hence  we  know 


166  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

that  the  prerequisite  source  of  force  and  life  cannot 
be  merely  mechanical  and  sentient,  but  imperatively 
urgent  as  is  our  reason,  only  that  it  is  the  Absolute 
Reason  whence  our  finite  reason  was  derived. 

Herein  is  the  business  of  a  concrete  logic  consum- 
mated, by  the  established  validity  of  a  knowing  which 
reaches  beyond  any  human  experiencing.  We  are 
already  quite  beyond  all  phenomenal  experience  in 
our  knowing,  and  may  yet  further  step  even  beyond 
a  "  transcendental  "  experience,  and  know  that  which 
Kant  has  termed  "transcendent"  as  exceeding  the 
transcendental,  and  which  he  excludes  from  the  pos- 
sibility of  human  attainment.  With  him  all  knowing 
is  empty  which  cannot  fill  itself  with  an  empirical 
content,  and  so  force  and  life  are  mere  mental  notions 
which  we  may  assume  because  we  cannot  think  orderly 
without  them,  but  which  we  cannot  verify  because 
we  cannot  consciously  experience  them  ;  and  then 
much  more  must  immortal  spirit  and  Absolute  Deity 
be  incognizable,  which  never  admit  of  even  their 
appearance  to  any  sense-envisagement.  But  the 
knowing  which  validly  attains  the  "transcendental" 
by  its  insight  of  the  phenomenal,  can  in  the  same 
way,  and  with  equal  validity,  attain  the  "  transcen- 
dent "  by  its  insight  of  the  transcendental.  In  veri- 
table force  and  rational  life,  which  are  the  transcen- 
dental, we  can  know  the  Absolute  Godhead,  which  is 
Kant's  transcendent. 

We  need,  therefore,  an  outline  of  the  transcendental 
knowledge  attained  of  force  and  life,  as  the  substan- 


ABSOLUTE   BEING   ABOVE  EXPERIENCE.         167 

tial  essences  of  the  inorganic  and  organic  Universe,  in 
order  that  by  an  insight  of  them  we  may  read  what  is 
primitively  and  permanently  conditional  for  them. 

1.  We  know  a  constructing  agency  as  a  pure  intel- 
ligent activity  in  the  prerequisite  conditions  for  the 
facts  of  pure  figures  and  intuitive  demonstrations  in 
Mathematics.      Abstractions  from   phenomena  could 
not  determine  the  experience,  but  must  be  themselves 
determined   by   the   experience,   and   so   a   concrete 
agency  is  prerequisite  for  all  experience  in  pure  math- 
ematics. 

2.  Knowledge  is  conditioned  to  an  objective  known 
as  well  as  to  a  subjective  knower,  and  no  subjective 
construction  of  pure  figure  can  impress  sense-organs 
in  common.     Organic  sense-affections  are  conditioned 
upon  certain  outer  activities,  and  the  sensations  in- 
tellectually distinguished   and   defined   become   per- 
ceived phenomena  in  consciousness. 

3.  Conscious  phenomena,  in  order  to  become   or- 
derly experience,  must  be  known  in  their  logical  Re- 
lations, and  these  not  of  abstract  collocation  alone 
that  gives  mere  relative  place  and  period,  but  of  con- 
crete connection  that  stands  in  antagonist  and  diremp- 
tive  forces,  and  are  truly  material  and  ethereal  sub- 
stances.    In  equal  balance   of   the   impulses  or  ex- 
pulses,  the  substance  is  static  ;  when  there  is  an  excess 
of  energy  on  one  side,  the  substance  is  in  motion,  and 
has  become  dynamic. 

4.  The  interaction  of  the  forces  determines  all  em- 
bodying, moving,  changing,  and  distributing  of  inor- 
ganic substances. 


168  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

5.  Organic  existence  presupposes  the  feeling  of  a 
specific  need  superinduced  upon  force,  so  that  as  a 
suffused  want  it  urges  the  force  in  the  way  and  to  the 
specific  end  of  its  longing,  and  such  possession   of 
force  by  feeling  is  Life,   spontaneously  working   an 
organism   for   itself  by  assimilating   appropriate  ele- 
ments and  combining  them  in  a  living  structure. 

6.  Life  in  the  vegetable  kingdom  assimilates  the 
elements  from  their  crude  inorganic  state  solely  to  the 
construction  of  its  own  organism  and  the  reproduc- 
tion of  its  species,  and  the  distinct  species  has  an 
original  type  transmitted  with  varieties  through  indi- 
vidual descendants. 

7.  The  animal  kingdom  has  life  in  which  the  want 
urges  to  the  construction  of  an  organism  for  the  fur- 
ther  and   much  higher  end   of  conscious  sensation, 
using  only  elements  already  assimilated,  blended  with 
nitrogen  into  the  nervous   arrangement  of  irritable 
fibres  and  central  ganglions  and  grand  co-ordinating 
sensorium,  by  which  the  individual  becomes  sentient, 
and  consciously  perceives,  remembers,  and  judges,  ac- 
cording to  acquired  experience. 

8.  Humanity  has  reason  superadded  to  sense,  and 
the  life-want  constructs  its  organism  to  both  the  ends 
of  a  sentient  soul  and  a  rational  spirit  as  instinctively 
as  in  plant  or  brute  embodying,  and  also  instinctively 
opens  in  conscious  experience  ;  but  this  opened  expe- 
rience has  rational  imperatives  to  control  sense-appe- 
tites, and  in  this  is  found  human  personality,  liberty, 
responsibility,  and  consequent  immortality. 


ABSOLUTE  BEING  ABOVE  EXPERIENCE.          169 

9.  There  is  thus  constituted  a  universe  in  which 
the  inorganic  force  and  the  organic  life  stand  together 
inseparably  connected.  The  organic  plant  and  ani- 
mal have  individuality  of  existence  without  person- 
ality ;  the  human  alone  is  personal,  and  in  this  super- 
natural ;  and  though  held  perpetually  in  corporeal 
forces,  is  still  competent  to  spiritual  communion. 

These  facts  give  occasion  for  the  insight  to  at- 
tain, — 

1.  PREREQUISITE  CONDITIONS  FOR  FORCE. — 
Force  is  known  by  the  insight  of  reason  into  con- 
scious perception  as  necessarily  conditional  for  the 
phenomena  perceived,  and  thereby  becomes  a  con- 
scious intuition  of  reason.  All  force  is  complex  as 
constituted  of  either  impulses  in  antagonism  or  of 
expulses  in  repellency,  and  these  elementary  impulses 
or  expulses  are  simple  energies  in  activity  to  or  from 
each  other,  and  which  in  combination  become  by  the 
peculiarity  of  their  action  antagonist  or  diremptive 
force.  These  elementary  energies  are  the  prerequi- 
sites of  the  forces,  and  in  simple  activity  they  must 
come  essentially  from  a  source  which  is  antecedent  to 
any  existent  forces.  The  force  is  the  fact,  or  thing 
made,  and  must  come  from  a  producing  source  com- 
petent to  originate  universal  forces.  This  source  is 
thus  Omnipotent;  for  the  very  conception  and  defini- 
tion of  omnipotence  is,  power  to  constitute  and  use 
all  forces.  The  source  is  not  itself  force  ;  it  has  in 
itself  the  energies  constituting  and  controlling  all 
forces,  and  is  thus  properly  the  ruling  power  using 


170  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

the  entire  forces  of  the  universe.  The  inorganic 
universe  is  essentially  substantial  force,  and  a  pre- 
requisite condition  for  it  is  a  Source  of  Omnipotent 
energizing. 

And  again,  this  Omnipotent  energy  must  be  Omni- 
present. The  universe  is  only  when,  and  as  the  force 
is,  and  the  essential  energy  constituting  the  force 
taken  away  from  any  place  necessitates  a  collapse  of 
the  universe  in  that  place,  and  so  a  destruction  of  its 
unity,  for  there  its  substantial  force  is  annihilated. 
The  definition  of  Omnipresence  is  just  this  upholding 
energy  in  each  and  all  places  universally. 

This  Omnipotent  and  Omnipresent  energy  must  be 
also  Eternal.  Not  only  must  the  universal  places,  but 
the  universal  periods  as  well,  be  filled  with  this  active 
energizing.  Withdrawing  or  withholding  it  at  any 
period  must  be  as  fatal  to  universality  and  integrity 
of  existence  as  would  be  its  cessation  in  any  place. 
The  definition  of  eternal  power  is  just  this  constituting 
and  controlling  energy  persistent  in  every  period. 

This  source  of  universal  energy  constituting  and 
using  the  universal  forces  is  antecedent  to,  and  so  in- 
dependent of,  all  force,  and  therefore  has  its  being 
irrespective  of  space  or  time.  The  active  energizing 
makes  and  upholds  and  moves  the  universal  forces, 
and  itself  was  when  as  yet  they  were  not,  and  in 
making  and  moving  them  there  is  constituted  the  uni- 
versal extensions  and  successions,  and  so  comes  the 
knowing  in  them  of  the  one  universal  space  and  one 
universal  time  in  common  for  all  intelligences.  All 


ABSOLUTE  BEING   ABOVE  EXPERIENCE.         171 

could  not  have  the  same  one  space  and  one  time  as 
each  has,  except  as  all  attained  their  knowledge  of 
their  space  and  time  from  the  same  extensions  and 
successions,  and  these  from  the  same  spread-out  and 
passing  universal  forces. 

While,  however,  the  finite  intelligences  of  the  uni- 
verse are  made  respectively  individual  by  their  indi- 
vidual incorporation  into  their  appropriate  substantial 
forces,  and  each  corporeity  is  held  within  the  univer- 
sal forces,  and  subjected  to  the  reciprocal  action  of 
them  all,  and  so  is  comprehended  in  their  universality 
of  space  and  time,  yet  is  this  prerequisite  source  of  all 
energy,  independent  of  the  universal  forces,  ante- 
dating them  all,  and  itself  stands  outside,  and  beyond 
all  their  activities  and  extensions  in  place  and  succes- 
sions in  period,  and  to  which  all  their  reciprocities 
and  co-agencies  and  relative  localities  and  periodicities 
have  no  possible  pertinence.  The  universe  is  deter- 
mined by  the  pre-existing  Omnipotent  Energy,  and 
this  energy,  which  is  irrespective  of  the  universe,  can 
have  no  interfering  modifications  and  changes  from 
the  forces  and  places  and  periods  of  the  universe. 
They  are  even  more  subject  to  this  power  than  the 
clay  in  the  hand  of  the  potter,  for  the  potter  can 
only  modify  and  use  the  clay  as  he  finds  it,  but  the 
Omnipotent  Energizing  makes  the  universal  forces, 
and  puts  them  in  their  respective  places  and  periods. 
The  forces  cannot  be  but  in  the.  combined  working 
of  the  single  activities,  and  the  single  activities  can- 
not be  but  as  they  have  their  energizing  in  a  pre-exist- 


172  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

ing  source,  and  so  all  inorganic  being  is  the  creature 
*of  an  Omnipotent  Energy,  and  its  existence  in  kind, 
place,  and  period  is  determined  by  essential  laws  al- 
ready in  the  source  before  the  production  of  the  uni- 
versal forces. 

2.  PREREQUISITE  CONDITIONS  FOR  L  FE. —  Life 
is  essentially  force,  possessed  by  the  urgency  of  a 
want,  the  urgency  in  the  lower  stages  of  life  prompt- 
ing and  using  the  force  in  unconscious  spontaneity, 
and  so  making  the  living  activity  to  be  wholly  instinc- 
tive. In  the  plant,  as  we  have  seen,  the  life- want 
works  instinctively  to  the  end  of  constructing  its  own 
organism,  and  then  in  it  reproducing  its  own  type  in 
the  multiplied  individuals  of  the  species.  In  the  an- 
imal the  life-want  adds  to  that  of  the  plant  a  further 
end  for  which  it  works,  that  in  its  constructed  organ- 
ism may  be  found  the  occasion  for  waking  from  spon- 
taneous instinct  to  conscious  sensation.  In  human 
life  there  is  added  the  still  very  much  higher  end,  that 
in  his  more  perfect  organism  man  may  find  occasion 
for  rising  from  sentient  consciousness  to  the  dignity 
and  responsibility  of  conscious  rational  activity.  In 
all  life  the  force  is  the  immediate  efficiency,  and  the 
want  is  the  urging  and  guiding  agency  in  the  organ- 
izing construction ;  in  the  human  organism,  all  the 
ends  of  life  meet  in  unity,  —  the  instinctive,  the  sen- 
tient, and  the  rational ;  and  thus  to  find  the  pre- 
requisite condition  for  human  life,  will  be  to  find  in  one 
source  that  which  can  be  necessary  in  any  and  all 
living  being. 


i 

ABSOLUTE  BEING  ABOVE  EXPERIENCE.    173 

Mechanical  force  and  the  feeling  of  need  are  dif- 
ferent existences  in  kind,  and  the  latter  cannot  be 
any  product  of  the  former ;  and  yet  that  the  force 
should  be  possessed  by  the  feeling  of  need,  which  is  a 
want,  is  that  alone  which  can  make  the  force  to  become 
a  living  power.  To  a  rational  mind  it  may  clearly  be 
seen  that  simple  energies  working  in  conflict,  as  either 
antagonistic  or  diremptive,  while  they  constitute  force, 
are  wholly  lacking  in  a  feeling  of  need  ;  yet  a  mere 
lack  of  the  feeling  of  need  cannot  supply  the  feeling, 
any  more  than  mere  force  can  put  itself  in  possession 
of  feeling.  The  want  must  have  positive  existence 
as  feeling,  and  this  must  be  to  the  force  wholly  a  new 
product  diffused  throughout  the  force  ;  and  by  so  much 
as  it  is  feeling  added  to  force,  it  is  more  than  can  be 
got  from  force,  and  must  come  from  some  source  ut- 
terly beyond  it.  When  the  feeling  is  made  to  have 
possession  of  the  force,  the  two  must  of  course  be  so 
conjoined  as  equivalents  that  the  two  can  steadfastly 
consist  together  while  the  feeling  shall  spontaneously 
urge  the  force  to  the  attainment  of  its  end.  The 
feeling  is  that  of  a  deficiency,  and  the  force  possessed 
must  be  adequate  to  fill  the  want,  and  so  the  com- 
bined force  and  feeling  of  deficiency  become  a  posi- 
tive efficiency  in  supplying  at  the  very  point  lacking ; 
and  as  conditional  for  all  this,  it  is  necessary  that  the 
force  and  feeling  come  from  one  and  the  same  source, 
and  carry  in  their  combination  the  one  intent,  that  as 
a  type  or  pattern  shall  be  that  after  which  the  whole 
must  work,  and  which  only  in  such  way  it  can  exe- 


174  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

ecute.  This  source  of  both  force  and  feeling  is  above 
and  beyond  all  force  and  feeling,  and  as  their  pro- 
ducer, is  independent  of  them ;  and  if  taken  as  ulti- 
mate and  personal  source,  we  can,  for  human  in  com- 
mon with  vegetable  and  animal  life,  say,  in  the  words 
of  inspired  revelation,  "  In  Him  we  live/' 

And  in  the  same  way  we  get  the  prerequisite  con- 
dition for  sensation  added  to  life,  as  above,  of  instinc- 
tive feeling  added  to  force.  The  force  and  want  in 
combination,  which  constitute  a  life^power  adequate 
for  any  plant-organism,  are  not  therein  competent  for 
the  production  of  a  sentient  body.  For  the  sentient 
organism  the  life-power  must  be  competent  to  so  con- 
struct it  that  it  can  carry  itself  from  place  to  place,  and 
use  its  own  members  in  selecting  and  taking  the  ma- 
terials which  gratify  appetite  ;  and  this  must,  on  both 
sides  of  the  force  and  the  feeling,  have  more  in  it  than 
that  life-power  has  which  exhausts  all  its  capabilities  in 
building  a  vegetable  organism  that  can  neither  leave 
its  place,  nor  be  conscious  of  its  activity  in  its  place, 
nor  rise  to  any  conscious  agency  in  propagating  its 
species.  This  sentient  life  is  of  further  intent,  and 
from  a  deeper  energy  than  any  plant-life ;  and  yet  as 
the  vegetable  kingdom  is  the  destined  sustenance  pri- 
marily for  the  animal  kingdom,  and  especially  as  every 
animal  instinct  that  builds  up  its  organism  is  subse- 
quently to  wake  up  in  it  and  use  it  in  conscious  sense- 
gratification,  the  source  from  whence  both  the  uncon- 
scious instinct  and  the  conscious  sense  come  must  be 
one  and  the  same,  wisely  putting  the  higher  life-power 


ABSOLUTE  BEING   ABOVE  EXPERIENCE.         175 

in  combination  as  designed  and  adapted  to  consum- 
mate the  previous  intent  which  had  already  fitted  the 
lower  life  to  work  in  full  subserviency.  The  appe- 
titive urgency  is  the  conscious  moving  agency,  and  as 
this  is  but  a  fuller  measure  of  the  same  creating  wis- 
dom that  has  given  primitive  life,  so  we  may  still  fur- 
ther say  in  common  for  all  sentient  being,  not  only 
that  in  Him  we  live,  but  also  that  in  Him  "  we 
move." 

And  then  in  the  same  way,  still  further,  we  may 
read  the  prerequisite  conditions  for  the  being  of  hu- 
man conscious  rationality.  Plant-instinct  and  ani- 
mal-sense combined,  reach  to  no  higher  experience 
than  a  conscious  urgency  moving  to  action  in  the  in- 
terest of  gratified  appetite,  and  the  plant  and  animal 
live  respectively  in  their  kingdoms  subordinate  and 
subservient  to  man ;  and  in  man  himself  there  is  the 
combination  of  instinctive  life  and  sentient  appetite, 
and  the  one  end  of  sentient  life  is  everywhere  appe- 
titive gratification,  properly  termed  end  in  happiness. 
This  alone  cannot  attain  to  an  agency  working  from 
choice,  since  it  cannot  stand  between  alternatives  dif- 
fering in  kind,  for  all  gratification  of  appetite  is  hap- 
piness, and  has  difference  only  in  degree.  But  man 
has  more  than  combined  instinct  and  sense  in  his  su- 
peradded  prerogative  of  rationality.  His  reason  is 
imperative,  and  competent  to  dominion  over  all  appe- 
tite, and  its  urgency  is  in  the  interest  of  worthiness 
in  distinction  from  all  happiness,  and  so  man  can 
know  himself  as  standing  between  alternatives  differ- 


176  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

ing  in  kind,  and  can  be  conscious  of  an  experience  in 
responsible  freedom,  and  not  merely  of  brute-will,  in 
necessarily  executing  the  stronger  appetite.  And  yet 
as  sentient  urgency  is  combined  in  man  with  the  ur- 
gency from  rational  authority,  and  the  imperative  was 
manifestly  intended  to  control  and  guide  the  appe- 
titive, such  ordering  bespeaks  the  higher  measure  of 
wisdom  in  one  and  the  same  source  that  has  put  the 
rational  at  last  to  govern  that  which  had  been  previ- 
ously made  subordinate  in  the  animal.  The  man  has 
a  rational  insight  through  the  instinct  and  sense  into 
his  reason  and  spirit,  and  he  knows  his  rational  spirit 
to  be  other  and  more  excellent  than  the  sentient. 
Sense  in  living  force,  persistent  in  possession  thereof 
as  permanent  substance,  gives  animal  individuality  ; 
but  reason  superadded  to  sense,  gives  conscious  per- 
sonality, and  so,  in  common  with  all  men,  it  must  be 
said  of  this  higher  endowment  of  personal  selfhood, 
not  only  that  in  Him  we  live  and  move,  but  in  Him 
"  we  are,"  as  in  Him  we  have  personally  "  our  being." 
That  this  human  being,  living  sentient  and  rational 
as  he  is,  should  thus  stand  at  the  head  of  our  world 
inclusively,  both  of  the  inorganic  and  the  organic, 
and  that  our  world  should  be  so  connected  to  all 
worlds  that  all  stand  and  turn  together  on  their  com- 
mon centre  as  a  universe,  consistent  in  one  common 
space,  and  persistent  in  one  common  time,  unmistaka- 
bly bespeak  one  intelligent  Source  out  of  which  all 
have  come  and  in  which  all  abide.  And  this  one 
originating  Source  is  utterly  above  and  independent 


ABSOLUTE  BEING   ABOVE  EXPERIENCE.          177 

of  the  universal  out-flow,  to  which  force  and  space 
and  time  and  organic  life  and  sensation  can  have  no 
essential  relevancy,  and  can  be  only  consequential  on 
this  creating  activity.  The  universe,  in  its  space  and 
time,  could  not  be  except  as  this  intelligent  Source 
already  was,  and  this  originating  Source  so  being  the 
universe  must  be,  and  that  the  universe  so  is,  most 
clearly  indicates  that  it  must  have  been  in  execution 
of  a  previous  purpose. 

While,  then,  all  finite  experience  must  be  in  and  of 
the  universe,  and  be  held  within  its  space  and  time, 
and  be  determinable  to  its  places  and  periods,  the 
conscious  agency  of  the  originating  Intelligence  must 
essentially  be  independent  of  the  universe,  and  in  no 
wise  a  pertinent  part  of  it.  Force  and  life  and  sen- 
sation are  its  component  elements,  and  human  reason 
also  is  embodied  in  living  and  sentient  forces,  and 
thus  restricted  within  the  universe ;  and  individual 
personality  can  maintain  its  finite  distinction  in  the 
universe  only  as  held  within  the  substantial  forces  ap- 
propriately identifying  its  spiritual  selfhood  ;  but  the 
originating  Source  of  forces  and  lives  and  senses  and 
finite  personalities  has  its  essence  subjected  to  no  sub- 
stantial corporeity,  acts  through  no  vitalized  organ- 
ism, and  receives  no  impressions  inducing  nervous 
sensations.  They  all  originate  from  this,  while  this 
everlastingly  was  and  is  above  them  and  independent 
of  them.  Already  seen  to  be  Omnipotent,  Omnipres- 
ent, and  Eternal,  as  the  Source  of  universal  being, 
and  so  abiding  beyond  what  any  finite  experience  can 
12 


178  COXCKETE    LOGIC. 

reach,  we  have  yet  occasion  for  one  further  advance 
step  for  our  logic,  viz.,  to  note  in  what  way  and  to 
how  great  extent  our  human  reason  may  come  to 
know  the  essential  perfections  and  intrinsic  attributes 
and  modes  of  being  and  action  of  this  Absolute  Source 
,of  universal  existence.  We  shall  never  carry  our  ex- 
perience over  into  the  conscious  experience  of  the 
Absolute,  but  logically  we  may  carry  our  knowledge 
quite  beyond  that  of  power  and  presence  in  universal 
place  and  period. 

3.  THE  HUMAN  REASON  MAY  KNOW  WHAT  rs  Es- 
.SENTIAL  IN  ABSOLUTE  REASON.  —  We  have  already 
brought  the  human  reason  fully  to  light,  and  what  as 
.human  faculty  it  is  competent  intellectually  to  accom- 
plish. It  can  see  substantial  force  in  the  inorganic 
.phenomena,  and  essential  life  in  the  organic  phenom- 
ena, with  its  rising  grades  of  urgency  to  activity  in 
plant-instinct,  sentient  appetite,  and  rational  impera- 
tive ;  and  further,  it  can  read  space  in  place  and  time 
in  period,  and  know  that  the  universal  places  and  pe- 
riods must  give  one  common  space  for  all  extensions, 
,and  one  common  time  for  all  successions.  It  knows 
itself  to  be  ultimate  background  for  all  sentient  ap- 
pearance, and  in  this  attains  a  higher  consciousness, 
in  the  light  of  which  is  expounded  the  connections 
of  Universal  Experience.  Further  still,  it  knows 
from  the  universe  an  Absolute  Source  above  it  and 
independent  of  it,  from  whence  the  universe  origi- 
nated, and  whereby  it  is  perpetually  supplied  and 
supported.  And  now,  lastly,  we  withdraw  direct 


ABSOLUTE   BEING   ABOVE   EXPERIENCE.         179 

attention  from  the  existent  universe,  and  with  our 
finite  human  reason  look  into  this  absolute  Source  to 
find  so  far  as  may  be  what  we  can  know  must  be  its 
essence  and  its  attributes. 

What  is  commonly  meant  by  The  Absolute,  when 
taken  as  an  abstraction  from  human  experience,  is  the 
conception  of  pure  being  from  whence  all  attributes 
have  been  taken.  The  abstraction  has  been  carried 
to  an  edge  so  thin  and  a  point  so  fine  that  nothing 
can  be  predicated  of  it,  and  such  negation  of  all  posi- 
tive possession  is  the  ultimate  which  abstract  logic 
can  find  and  retain  as  its  Author  of  the  Universe.  No 
thinking  can  get  any  judgment  from  it,  nor  find  any 
meaning  in  it.  But  the  Absolute,  when  taken  as 
Eternal  Reason,  is  a  concrete  of  infinite  possession, 
having  in  itself  all  that  is  essential  to  the  overt  produc- 
tion and  manifested  existence  of  the  universe,  with  all 
its  mechanical,  instinctive,  sensitive,  and  responsible 
agencies.  There  is  not  merely  negative  absolution 
from  universal  coercion,  but  positive  resources  for 
free  origination,  sustentation,  and  consummation  of 
the  universe  essentially  within  itself.  Not  by  any 
abstraction  expanded  to  so  broad  a  generalization  can 
we  attain  any  satisfactory  conception  of  an  Author  of 
the  universe,  nor  any  intelligent  comprehension  of 
the  universe  itself  in  its  connections  an$  dependen- 
cies. We  must  apply  the  same  insight  of  reason 
to  the  Source,  by  the  method  of  a  concrete  and  inte- 
grant logic,  that  has  brought  us  to  the  knowledge  of 
the  being  of  universal  nature  in  its  forces  and  vitali- 


180  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

ties.  Not  by  any  abstract  "searching  can  we  find 
out  God,"  but  by  the  reason-insight  we  can,  "from 
the  creation  of  the  world,  clearly  see  the  eternal 
power  and  Godhead."  Embodied  reason  can  never 
enter  within  the  conscious  experience  of  the  Deity, 
but  in  the  knowledge  of  itself  the  human  spirit  can 
know  more  than  merely  what  is  not,  even  positively 
what  is,  the  essence  of  the  Divine  Spirit. 

Human  reason,  though  allied  to  sentient  life,  yet 
knows  itself  in  distinction  from  all  sensation.  Force 
is  a  new  existence  as  static  contest  of  original  ener- 
gies, and  life  is  new  existence  as  original  urgency  pos- 
sessing and  using  force,  and  sensation  is  new  exist- 
ence as  irritable  nerve-centre,  bringing  outer  impres- 
sion and  inner  affection  to  conscious  feeling ;  but 
human  reason  is  an  impartation  from  its  uncreated 
source  of  that  in  man,  which  ever  was  and  ever  is 
in  unchanged  likeness  to  its  original.  It  is  ever 
reason,  both  in  its  source  and  in  its  imparted  individ- 
ualization ;  and  what  only  is  new  is  individual  sen- 
tient life  endowed  with  and  possessed  by  imparted 
rationality,  in  which  sentient  individuality  is  made 
personal,  and  rational  personality  is  made  individual. 
There  is  no  individualizing  out  of  the  uncreated 
source  of  reason  but  by  some  incorporation  of  ration- 
ality in  individualized  sentiency.  Whether  human 
or  conceived  angelic  existence  is  in  question,  neither 
can  be  known  as  individual  personal  existence  out 
from  its  unmanifested  source,  except  as  imparted 
reason  to  some  substantial  corporeity.  This  makes 


ABSOLUTE  BEING  ABOVE  EXPERIENCE.    181 

the  man  and  the  angel  to  be  in,  and  portions  of,  the 
universe,  while  the  unembodied  Reason  is  Absolute 
Spirit,  independent  of  the  universe.  Both  the  meas- 
ure of  the  reason  and  the  manner  of  substantial  force 
embodied  may  differ  in  human  or  in  supposed  angelic 
beings,  but  rationality,  in  some  mode  of  individualized 
substantial  embodying,  is  conditional  for  knowing  any 
personal  spirit  as  within  the  universe,  and  a  compo- 
nent portion  of  it.  The  unembodied  "  Father  of 
Spirits "  is  above  the  universe,  and  independent 
Creator  and  upholder  of  it.  The  sentient  portion  of 
the  human  being  is  the  animal  soul,  the  rational  por- 
tion of  humanity  is  the  personal  spirit,  and  what  in 
the  mere  animal  is  brute-sentiency  only,  standing  in 
the  nervous  organism,  and  lost  in  its  dissolution,  be- 
comes in  the  human  person  immortal  soul  in  the  right 
and  claim  of  the  responsible  spirit ;  and  as  joint  par- 
ticipants in  probationary  disposition,  soul  and  spirit 
must  stand  together  in  unity  in  the  retributive  future 
experience  of  every  individual  personality. 

Taking,  thus,  the  distinctive  human  reason  as  com- 
ing in  its  measure  to  man  from  the  uncreated  and  un- 
embodied Absolute  Source,  and  whose  urgencies  to 
activity  are  the  imperative  claims  of  either  beauty, 
truth,  or  goodness,  —  i.  e.,  either  taste  in  art,  science 
in  philosophy,  or  righteousness  in  morals  and  piety,  — 
we  may  put  its  insight  directly  to  itself  to  come  to 
the  knowledge  of  what  is  the  essence,  and  what  the 
attributes  of  its  Absolute  Source. 

A  number  of  steps,  consequential  one  upon  another, 


182  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

taken  with  careful  precision,  will  lead  to  as  many 
particulars,  which  human  reason  may  see  must  neces- 
sarily be  in  the  Absolute  Source  of  all  being. 

1.  Finite  reason  already  is,  and  knows  both  itself 
and  its  dependence  on  a  higher  source  for  its  individ- 
uality of  existence.     What  is  not  subject  to  reason  is 
against  it,  and  therefore  reason  cannot  come  from  un- 
reason ;  and  thus  above  the  finite  must  be  the  Abso- 
lute Reason,  which  must  stand  independent  in  its  own 
essence.     Absolute  Reason  is  self -essential. 

2.  This   Absolute  Reason,  purely  as  reason,  must 
know  all  that  itself  is,  and  all  that  its  knoAvlege  urges 
its  activity  to  accomplish,  and  must  thus  be  thoroughly 
self-conscious.     Absolute   Reason  is   essentially  self- 
intelligent. 

3.  This    conscious   urgency  to   activity  must   be 
competent  to  accomplish  its  ends  and  fulfil  its  own 
behests,  or  the  inward  disagreement  between  known 
claims  and  conscious  performance  must  make  the  un- 
satisfied reason  to  become  unreason.    Absolute  Reason 
is  self-sufficient. 

4.  The  urgencies  to  activity  in  reason  are  ever  im- 
perative, and  never  appetitive  as  in  sense  ;  and  in  Ab- 
solute Reason  the  imperatives  are  behests  springing  out 
of  conscious  intrinsic  worth  and  excellency,  and  can 
come  from  no  extrinsic  authority,  and  thus  the  Abso- 
lute is  ever  self-law ;  and  as  efficient  to  execute  all  its 
urgencies,  Absolute  Reason  is  also  self-determining ; 
and  in  this  is  the  dignit}7-  of  independent  selfhood. 
The  self  only  makes  claims,  and  what  the  self  de- 


ABSOLUTE   BEING   ABOVE   EXPERIENCE.          183 

mands  the  self  alone  accomplishes.     The  Absolute  is 
ever  in  full  self-possession. 

5.  This  perpetual  self-possession  secures  a  persistent 
disposition  to  the  end  of  its  own  honor,  and  in  which 
is  the  continual  satisfying  of  the  claims  of  conscious 
intrinsic  worth  by  a  voluntarily  attained  worth  ;  and 
such  persistent  disposing  is  will  in  liberty,  and  also 
will  in  constant  integrity.     The  Absolute  Reason  is 
free-agency  in  full  self-approbation. 

6.  Free  Intelligence  can  act  executively  only   in 
the  subjective  possession  of  clear  ideas,  and  for  the 
proposing  to  himself  such  ideas  the  Absolute  must 
have  working  within  him  the  three  following  associ- 
ated activities,  viz.,  that  of  holding  the  manifold  ele- 
ments as  promiscuous  content  for  all  ideas  ;  the  sort- 
ing from  the  manifold  the  particulars  necessary  for 
the  specific  idea ;  and  the  combination  of  these  sorted 
elements  in  the  self-consistency  of  the  individual  idea  ; 
and  without  such  threefold  agency,  no  complete  idea 
can  be  made  to  stand  in  any  reason-consciousness. 
The  activities  must  be  readily  distinguishable,  though 
they  are  in  perfect  concert.     Neither  the  apprehen- 
sion of  the  manifold,  nor  the  sorting  of  the  needed 
particulars  can  be  sufficient,  and  full  knowing  can  be 
secured  only  as  the  arranged  particulars  are  made  in- 
dissoluble in  the  grasp  of  the  reason,  in   which  is 
accomplished  literally  the  individuality  of  the  mani- 
fold elements.     In  proposing  practical  ideas  to  him- 
self,   the    Absolute   Reason  is   essentially    threefold 
activity  in  concert. 


184  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

7.  Human  reason  is  shut  within  its  own  organism, 
and  can  use  for  expressing  its  inner  ideas  to  others 
only  the  already  made  forces  in  which  itself  is  em- 
bodied.     But  Absolute  Reason  is   unembodiad,  and 
must  himself  make  the  forces  that  shall  manifest  his 
hidden  idea.     The  clear  practical  idea  ever  urges  rea- 
son to  its  expressed  communication,  and  whether  in 
the  aspect  of  beauty,  truth,  or  goodness,  the  con- 
certed ideal  plans  of  the  Absolute  will  lovingly  press 
to  their  execution,  in  which  will  necessarily  be  in- 
volved a  literal  creation.     The  thought-out  plan  must 
also  become  wrought-out  substance,  and  the  secret 
idea   must  "  stand  fast "   in   open  fact,  in   order  to 
which  the  activities  thinking  in  concert  must  supple- 
ment the  thought-result  by  a  solid  environment  which 
shall  impress  the  sense.     Absolute  Reason  will  pass 
from  ideal  constructions  to  substantial  force-creation. 

8.  To  manifest  the   full  idea  in  substantial  force 
requires  an  authoritative  control  by  a  persistent  pro- 
posing of  the  ideal  plan,  an  answering  expression  of 
each    particular  element  in   substantial    appropriate 
force,  and  a  combination  of  the  joint  particulars  in 
thought  and  substance  into  a  consistent  individual- 
ity.    No  created  thing  can  be  either  intelligently  ex- 
pressed or  intelligently  apprehended  except  in  a  com- 
plete fulfilment  of  these  requisitions,  and  the  holding 
of  the  idea  in  authoritative  control  is  necessarily  the 
part  of  a  distinct  voluntary  agency,  while  also  the  ener- 
gizing in  the  particular  force-expressing  is  necessarily 
the  part  of  another  voluntary  agency,  and  the  put- 


ABSOLUTE  BEING   ABOVE  EXPERIENCE.         185 

ting  the  substantial  particular  forces  into  a  consistent 
whole  is  the  necessary  part  of  still  another  voluntary 
agency,  all  being  distinct  while  all  are  active  together. 
Each  must  also  do  its  work  in  consciousness  for  itself, 
and  also  in  consciousness  of  what  is  done  by  the  oth- 
ers, and  therefore  each  must  have  a  self-appropriation 
of,  and  a  joint  communion  in,  the  one  consciousness 
of  the  One  Absolute  Reason.  The  three  agencies  are 
in  this  way  three  personalities  in  will,  while  they  are 
joint-participants  in  the  one  being  and  consciousness 
of  the  absolute.  One  creative  Reason  has  controlled 
in  a  paternal  will,  and  also  expressed  substantially  in 
a  filial  obedient  will,  and  also  fashioned  in  consistency 
substance  and  idea  in  a  spiritual  will,  the  last  exe- 
cuting the  processes  of  both  the  former.  The  Abso- 
lute Creator  is  one  Being  in  three-fold  personality. 

9.  Some  portions  of  creation  will  be  subsidiary  to 
others,  but  an  ultimate  end  must  have  been  proposed 
comprehensive  of  all  subordinate  ones,  and  this  can 
be  found  only  in  the  Creator  himself,  since  he  alone 
was  ere  that  which  was  to  come  from  him  was  yet 
unmanifested  within  him.  As  Absolute  Reason  he 
knows  himself  and  his  own  intrinsic  excellency  and 
worth  of  being,  and  so  is  conscious  of  what  is  due  to 
himself,  and  consequently  this  claim  to  act  for  his 
own  honor  and  dignity  must  be  his  ultimate  and  most 
comprehensive  urgency.  This  identical  object  of  at- 
tainment can  be  foreknown  only  to  himself  and  to 
others  but  just  as  the  executive  work  progresses,  yet 
without  any  speculative  particularity  through  what 


186  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

thing  it  is  to  be  gained,  it  is  sufficient  here  to  say,  in 
the  gross,  that  God  created,  and  thus  gave  outer  ex- 
pression to  his  inner  idea,  that  he  might  please  him- 
self. He  has  no  appetites  to  gratify,  and  hence  the 
pleasing  was  purely  spiritual,  and  fulfilled  in  his  own 
approbation  of  his  work.  He  looked  and  saw  all  was 
good.  For  this  the  most  orthodox  statement  is  the 
best  —  "He  created  all  Mugs  for  his  own  glory" 

10.  What  Absolute  Reason  has  created,  he  must 
overrule  for  the  attainment  of  his  final  end.  Me- 
chanical force  as  material  substance,  and  vital  power  as 
instinctive  or  sensitive  being,  are  but  physical  prod- 
nets,  and  cannot  be  satisfactory  as  ultimate  ends  in 
reason.  To  permit  activity  to  terminate  here,  would 
be  the  absurdity  that  reason  should  be  unreasonable, 
and  so  the  physical  can  be  but  as  instrumentally  sub- 
servient to  the  spiritual.  Both  matter  and  vegeta- 
ble and  animal  life  are  means  only  for  ministration  to 
reason.  Their  end  is  in  man,  and  man  as  rational 
personality  finds  his  end  in  communion  with  the  Abso- 
lute personality.  Hence  the  necessary  grades  in  di- 
vine government.  Force  can  only  push  and  pull  in 
mechanical  necessity.  Vegetable  life  can  only  act 
from  instinctive  want.  Sentient  life  acts  from  appeti- 
tive gratification,  and  has  necessary  determination  to 
the  end  of  highest  happiness.  The  Maker,  thus, 
must  govern  matter  by  force,  and  mere  life  by  in- 
stinct, and  animal  life  by  sense ;  but  man  is  spiritual, 
and  God's  government  of  him  must  be  by  appeals  to 
that  which  is  reasonable.  Reason  can  check  and  control 


ABSOLUTE  BEING   ABOVE  EXPERIENCE.          187 

sense  by  holding  to  imperatives  rather  than  appetites, 
and  all  moral  government  is  in  this,  that  it  holds  the 
subject  to  the  duty  of  spiritual  approbation  before  all 
sense-gratification.  It  is  more  to  be  personally  wor- 
thy than  to  be  sentiently  happy,  and  God  approves 
that  man  the  best  who  honors  himself  the  most ;  for 
the  greatest  dishonor  man  can  do  to  God  is  in  de- 
basing and  dishonoring  his  own  spirit  in  his  sight. 
All  inorganic  matter  and  organic  life  is  nature,  and 
God  governs  it  b}^  its  own  necessitated  connections; 
and  all  Rational  existence  is  supernatural,  which  God 
governs  by  moral  and  'religious  interests  in  reason 
itself. 

11.  Nature  works  with  no  alternatives,  whether  in 
its  mechanical  forces,  instinctive  wants,  or  sentient 
appetites.  If  an  intended  ultimate  end  is  to  be  con- 
summated by  nature,  it  must  be  set  at  first  in  pre- 
established  harmony  to  such  end,  and  have  no  subse- 
quent interferences,  since  of  itself  nature  can  do  no 
other  than  run  through  its  necessitated  successions  to 
its  necessitated  point  of  ultimate  balanced  rest.  But 
nature  has  the  supernatural  rational  spirit  working  in 
it  in  human  personality,  and  initiating  its  own  inter- 
fering changes  ;  and  the  intended  ultimate  end,  then, 
cannot  be  consummated  except  by  superhuman  inter- 
positions guiding  the  human  activity  in  accordance 
with  the  ultimate  intent,  or  correcting  'any  untoward 
changes  humanly  introduced  in  nature.  Such  super- 
human interference  with  human  will  in  itself,  or  in  its 
introduced  changes  in  nature,  is  miracle,  and  in  a  uni- 


188  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

verse  where  rational  individuals  act  there  must  be 
supernatural  and  superhuman  interventions.  Mira- 
cles are  not  merely  rational  expectancies,  but  neces- 
sary incidentals  to  free  human  agency  and  divine 
ultimate  results.  Besides  all  this,  there  are  the  occa- 
sions for  superhuman  interpositions  in  nature  in  at- 
testation of  the  presence  and  pleasure  of  the  Abso- 
lute sovereignty.  If  a  revelation  is  to  be  made  in 
anything  beyond  nature's  teaching,  nothing  but  a  su- 
pernatural interference  can  adequately  attest  the 
supernatural  communication.  As  providential  and 
moral  Governor  of  the  Universe,  the  Absolute  Rea- 
son will  take  his  own  occasions  to  make  absolute 
miraculous  interventions. 

12.  Miraculous  interpositions  in  the  ongoing  of  na- 
ture must  be  wholly  within  the  determination  and 
control  of  the  Absolute  Reason,  and  as  persistently 
reason-restrained  as  reason-prompted.  The  ultimate 
end  is  to  be  reached  not  only  in  guiding  nature,  but 
in  consistency  with,  and  even  by,  the  direct  procur- 
ance  of  human  reason  in  human  liberty.  No  miracu- 
lous interventions  can  contravene  the  true  preroga- 
tives of  reason,  either  in  finite  individualties  or  in  the 
Absolute.  The  Absolute  Reason  urges  to  overt  man- 
ifestation, and  which  must  reach  intelligences  that 
can  apprehend  the  communication.  To  give  individ- 
uality to  such  intelligence  reason  must  take  possession 
of  specific  substantial  forces,  and  hold  them  in  unity, 
and  hold  such  individuality  also  in  connection  with, 
and  yet  in  personal  distinction  from,  the  other  uni- 


ABSOLUTE  BEING  ABOVE  EXPERIENCE.    189 

versal  forces.  Such  individuality  necessitates  the 
finite  personality  to  be  in  some  way  sense  and  spirit, 
and  so  necessarily  tries  and  tests  the  spiritual  dis- 
posing. Opportunity  to  dignify  himself  and  honor 
God,  necessarily  gives  possibility  to  the  finite  indi- 
vidual to  reproach  God  in  debasing  himself.  The 
virtue  of  the  human  individual  cannot,  from  the  na- 
ture of  the  case,  be  acquired  and  retained  but  at  the 
hazard  of  a  vicious  inclination  and  sinful  disposing. 
The  Absolute  Reason  requires  the  opportunity  for  the 
virtue  even  at  the  hazard  of  the  vice,  and  having  put 
the  individual  in  the  fairest  position  for  his  probation, 
it  behooves  him,  for  his  reason's  sake,  to  let  the  indi- 
vidual decide  the  issue  on  his  own  responsibility. 
The  virtue  itself  that  could  not  endure  hardness  and 
contradictory  influence  would  be  of  little  excellency. 
God  does  what  Absolute  Reason  may  for  virtue  and 
against  sin,  but  on  no  account  can  physical  interposi- 
tion miraculously  confirm  in  virtue  and  exclude  vice, 
and  so  when  sin  enters,  God  is  in  his  own  sight,  and 
openly  before  the  intelligent  universe,  in  full  self-in- 
tegrity, and  competent  fairly  to  judge  the  demerit  of 
the  sinner,  and  subject  to  reasonable  retribution  both 
the  righteous  and  the  wicked.  He  may  reasonably 
do  no  more  and  nothing  other  than  he  has  in  the 
making  and  proving  the  individual  persons,  and  the 
sin  the  individual  commits  is  by  God's  reasonable  per- 
mission. 

13.  Sin   stains   and   defiles   the   finite   personality 
only,   never   the   Absolute  Reason.     The   individual 


190  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

sinning  has  no  reason  for  his  wickedness,  but  all  rea- 
son has  been  against  it.  The  sin  is  in  the  renouncing 
of  reason  and  espousing  sense.  Appetite  has  been 
the  occasion,  gratification  of  appetite  the  motive,  but 
in  this  there  has  been  no  reason,  and  only  sin  from  the 
exclusion  of  reason.  If  the  gratification  had  been 
truly  for  a  reason,  it  would  not  have  been  vicious  but 
virtuous.  To  ask  a  reason  for  sin  is  folly  and  absurd- 
ity, since  to  find  a  reason  is  to  take  away  all  sinful- 
ness  from  any  action ;  and  to  plead  the  urgency  of 
appetite  which  was  its  occasion,  or  the  intensity  of 
gratification  which  was  its  motive,  as  any  extenuation 
or  excuse,  is  but  to  pronounce  the  sinner's  self-con- 
demnation, for '  the  essence  of  guilt  is  in  this  very 
thing,  that  the  act  was  from  appetite  not  reason,  and 
the  motive  gratification  not  approbation. 

And  all  the  sinfulness  of  the  act  is  at  the  expense 
of  the  sinning  person,  while  the  personality  of  Abso- 
lute Reason  in  all  connection  with  the  guilty  transac- 
tion has  neither  done  anything  nor  omitted  anything 
to  which  reason  did  not  prompt  and  which  it  does  not 
fully  approve.  It  is  neither  to  his  self-reproach,  nor 
to  any  reproach  in  the  sight  of  the  universe  towards 
,God,  that  any  sin,  or  that  so  much  sin,  has  been  in- 
troduced ;  and  though  grieved  and  angry,  yet  is  God's 
grief  and  anger  on  account  of  sin  only  to  just  the 
measure  and  of  just  the  kind  that  is  perfectly  reason- 
able. All  sin,  notwithstanding,  the  Absolute  Reason 
has  his  own  justification,  and  the  approval  of  reason 
in  every  individual  who  knows  his  action  towards  it. 


ABSOLUTE  BEING  ABOVE  EXPERIENCE.    191 

It  is  reason  only,  and  not  sense,  that  can  approve  or 
disapprove,  respect  or  abhor,  congratulate  or  commis- 
erate, in  anything.  Joy  and  sadness  are  from  the 
reason  and  in  the  spirit,  and  not  from  sense  and  in  the 
flesh  in  any  matter,  and  in  no  case  is  the  reason-sus- 
ceptibility of  the  Absolute  ever  unreasonably  excited. 
Sadness  in  its  place  is  as  reasonable  in  God  as  is 
gladness  in  its  place,  and  the  self-sufficiency  and  per- 
sistent integrity  of  the  Absolute  exclude  the  possibility 
of  any  unreasonable  disturbance.  Absolute  Reason  is 
conscious  of  perpetual  and  eternal  tranquillity  and  se- 
renity. 

14.  We  have  then,  at  last,  Absolute  Reason  in  its 
Absolute  fullness.  It  has  not  come  from  aught  above 
itself,  and  does  not  pass  on  to  aught  beyond  itself,  and 
is  ever  self-sufficient  to  execute  its  own  purposes. 
Its  energies  produce  and  perpetuate  the  universal 
forces,  and  put  the  proper  forces  in  the  possession  and 
use  of  their  respective  life-activities.  It  raises  sense 
to  consciousness  in  the  brute-organism,  and  gives 
manly  dignity  to  the  human  body  by  the  inspiration 
of  a  rational  spirit.  It  peoples  the  worlds  in  its  wis- 
dom, and  holds  them  all  in  one  space  and  one  time  by 
their  universal  connections.  It  originates  its  ideal 
plans  in  the  accordant  counsel  of  its  three-fold  agen- 
cies, and  these  agencies,  with  wills  distinct  in  person- 
ality permanently  abiding  in  the  one  being  and  con- 
sciousness of  reason,  give  overt  expression  to  the 
ideal  plan  in  steadfast  universal  substance.  It  is  it- 
self above  the  universe  it  creates  and  upholds,  and 


192  CONCRETE  LOGIC. 

guides  its  movements  in  consummation  of  an  original 
design,  and  to  the  intent  of  a  final  purpose. 

Within  the  universe  are  individual  personalities, 
who  have  yielded  to  sentient  appetites  against  the 
conscious  imperatives  of  reason,  and  have  thus  be- 
come sinful  by  consenting  to  become  unreasonable ; 
but  the  dishonor  to  reason  by  the  creature  has  car- 
ried no  impeachment  of  integrity  or  derogation  of 
dignity  over  to  the  Absolute  Creator.  Individual 
reason  in  some  cases  within  the  universe  has  become 
debased  by  its  prostitution  to  appetitive  indulgence, 
but  above  the  universe  is  no  unreason,  and  only  Rea- 
son in  absolute  wholeness  and  fullness,  and  holding  all 
finite  personalities  to  such  eternal  retributions  as  both 
satisfy  the  claim  and  magnify  the  honor  of  all  reason, 
finite  and  absolute.  Reason  is  here  fully  known  to 
be  absolutely  universal  and  eternal. 

In  such  process  of  excluded  doubt,  with  universal 
existence  known  as  under  the  control  of  one  Abso- 
lute Being,  Concrete  Logic  has  found  both  its  tri- 
umph and  its  termination. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 
BERKELEY 

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